


Give Him a Mask

by PyrrhaIphis



Category: Velvet Goldmine
Genre: Acting, Curt-centric, Eventual Romance, Getting Back Together, M/M, The infamous foul mouth of Curt Wild, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-22
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-09-24 14:32:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 48,975
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17102378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PyrrhaIphis/pseuds/PyrrhaIphis
Summary: Much to his own surprise, Curt Wild finds himself launched sideways from singing into acting.  His star ascends, but will it bring him happiness?  And will he ever get out of the shadow cast by Tommy Stone?(Yay!  I finally wrote a Curt-centric fic!)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> As usual, please let me know if there are any inappropriate Americanisms in the dialog or POV of British characters.

            Life was a yo-yo.  Curt’s life was, anyway.  He’d been in a very low place—coming off a three day hangover after he’d gotten shitfaced in disgust on seeing the live TV broadcast of Tommy Stone performing at Reynolds’ second inauguration—when he got the phone call.

            “I’m trying to reach Curt Wild,” the man on the other end of the line said.

            “That so?  What do you want with him?”  Curt knew better, by now, than to just admit who he was on the phone.  In person there wasn’t much point in denying it, but on the phone…better to know who the caller is and what they want first.

            “I’m trying to set up a meeting with him,” the man explained.  “About a movie.”

            “You want to license a song for a movie?  Talk to the record company.”  Curt had precious few rights regarding his own songs.

            “No, that’s not it at all!” the man exclaimed.  “I’m a director, you see, and—I’d really prefer to explain it in person, rather than over the phone.  Maybe we could meet over lunch?”

            Fuck, he’d recognized Curt’s voice, too?  Was his speaking voice really that unique?  There was something depressingly ironic about that, considering most reviewers listening to his records had always said that there was nothing about the performance—or the performer—that was in any way special, only the compositions, though most of the reviewers felt even those were lacking any value.  “When?” he asked.  No point in denying it, but he didn’t want to come out and admit it, either.

            “Maybe this Friday?” the man suggested.

            “Where?”  There wasn’t much point claiming he had anything else on his schedule.  If this guy was really who he said he was, he probably knew Curt didn’t have a manager right now.  And no manager equaled no more work to occupy his time…

            The man suggested a depressingly trendy restaurant in Manhattan.  The kind of place Tommy Stone would have a permanently reserved table.   While Curt was wondering if that was reason enough to tell him to fuck off, the man spoke again.  “Or someplace else, if you prefer.  I’ve been told there are a lot of nice restaurants in Little Italy…”

            So if this guy was really a director, he was from the Hollywood set, not one of the NYU crowd.  Well, if he was tourist, it wasn’t entirely his fault he didn’t know a really good restaurant from gimmicky crap.  “Harlem,” Curt said.  “There’s a club I like to go to.  Off the beaten path, good live music, good food.  Doesn’t charge bullshit prices.”

            “That sounds fantastic,” the man on the other end agreed.  His voice sounded like he was smiling.  Something about it made Curt feel like this guy really did want to see _him_ , not some warped misperception, or a cash cow waiting to be milked.

 

***

 

            It was a pretty old club.  Started out as a speakeasy, and a pretty upscale one, especially considering it was in Harlem.  Even after all these years, they hadn’t changed the décor; it was all early Art Deco and gilded paint.  Back then, it must have turned a tidy profit, but nowadays it was usually pretty quiet, unless the artist on stage had a lot of friends turn up to watch the performance.  Their stage accepted all sorts of musical acts:  old-school jazz, R&B, soul, reggae, rock of all flavors, and once in a while that rap stuff.  They had even let Curt perform a few times, despite that his skin was the wrong color.

            The food was terrific.  Traditional American, with a dash of New Orleans Creole, a little hint of Italian, and the occasional stray dish from Mexico or China.  Big portions, reasonable prices, and didn’t take too long to get to the table.  Or maybe it did, and the live shows just helped make it seem like it hadn’t been very long.  The staff were friendly, too, and they all treated Curt like an old friend—or more than that, considering how many of the waiters he had banged over the years.

            Tonight, Curt took a quiet booth, with a good view of the door, and not too close to the stage.  There was another bonus to coming here:  he’d know when his mystery caller came in, because just at the moment, Curt was the only white guy in the room, and based on previous visits to this club, that wasn’t likely to change for any reason other than the man he was there to meet.

            When the man finally arrived—about seven minutes late, by Curt’s watch—there was nothing about his appearance that Curt could use to get a read on his personality.  He was wearing fairly ordinary clothes, but they fit him so well that they were probably tailored, so he had money, but either not enough to dress flashy, or he chose _not_ to dress flashy.  His hair was a dirty blond not unlike Curt’s current hair color, cut in the prevailing fashion, and his face was neither attractive nor ugly:  he was downright average in just about every way.  Not like being a gorgeous guy with a terrible haircut, dressed in cheap, worn clothes that didn’t suit him, putting his poverty on display for everyone to laugh at.  The only thing this guy had in common with _him_ was that they seemed to be about the same age.

            “I’m so sorry I’m late!” the man exclaimed as he took a seat opposite Curt.  “I asked the taxi to arrive at the hotel twenty minutes early, but then the driver didn’t know where the club was, and traffic was terrible, and—”

            “Yeah, I get it,” Curt said, waving a hand to cut him off.  Not knowing how long it took to get places was the signature of the newcomer, no matter what city it was.  “Who are you, exactly?”

            “I told you on the phone.  I’m a director, and—”

            “Yeah, but you never told me your _name_ ,” Curt pointed out.  He hadn’t been able to find out if the guy actually was a director, because he’d had nothing to go on.

            “I didn’t?”

            Curt shook his head.

            “Oh!  I’m terribly sorry!  I’m Anthony West,” he said, with a slight blush, as he offered Curt his hand.

            Not sure what else to do, Curt went ahead and shook the hand.  “So what is it you want from me, if it’s not about licensing one of my songs?  You want me to write a new one for your movie?”  That would be nice, but he didn’t dare hope for it.  Probably something stupid, like sign off on having a parody of himself running around and being a barbaric idiot…

            West smiled weakly, and shook his head.  “It would be wonderful if you could, but I was actually hoping you’d agree to be _in_ the movie.”

            “Let me guess:  your leads go to a concert, and—”

            “No, no, you’d be the lead.”

            Curt just stared at him for a moment.  “Sorry, I must be drunk.  I thought I heard you say you wanted me to be the lead.”

            “That’s right.”

            “Why the fuck would you want that?  I’ve never acted before, and my career’s deader than dog shit.  I doubt movie audiences even remember who I am.”  Most of them probably never knew anyway.  He’d been reminded all too often in the last ten years that all the love he used to seem to get from the fans was really for Brian.  They had just accepted Curt for Brian’s sake.  They had never loved him.  Even the rare fans who loved him physically hadn’t really _loved_ him…

            West smiled.  “I’m not looking for box office cache; I don’t make that kind of movie.”  He shook his head.  “Let me start from the beginning.  You see, I…you probably hear this a lot, but back in the early ‘70s, when I was trying to come to grips with myself, just who and what I was…seeing your relationship with Brian Slade, and how everyone accepted it…it let me come to terms with myself in a way that probably saved me countless years of therapy.  I know so many men who’ve spent years hating themselves for being gay, but I never went through any of that, because I had you two showing me it was all right to love men.”

            Of course.  Curt fought against his scowl.  In the end, all anyone wanted from him was Brian.  He’d never met a single fan who was really _his_ fan.  They were all just reaching for Brian through him.  Even the ones who claimed to be in love with him just wanted to use him to _become_ Brian.

            “Oh, don’t misunderstand me!” West exclaimed.  “I’m not trying to make a pass at you—I’m in a very serious relationship right now.  In fact, it was because of him that I thought of this movie at all.  You see, I was telling him about you and Brian, and I mentioned the rumor that the break-up made you trash a recording studio—”

            “That’s not what happened,” Curt started to interrupt, but West wasn’t listening.

            “—and Todd—that’s my partner—he said that he wouldn’t feel comfortable dating someone who could just go around demolishing things like that, because it seemed a short leap from that to using violence on people.  Well, of course I defended you, but it set me to thinking, and soon enough I’d come up with this story idea.”

            “Er….”  Curt hadn’t felt quite this confused since the first time he’d heard Jerry talk.

            “The movie’s a rock-and-roll updating of the _Iliad_ , essentially,” West went on, heedless.  “The character you’d be playing is Achilles.  He’s not exactly based on you, per se, more like inspired by the myth that surrounds you.  Anyway, since you had such a bitter feud with him when he first appeared on the music scene, Hector is based on Tommy Stone.”

            “If you based Patroclus on Brian, you can fuck off right now.”  Though there would be a beautiful appropriateness to Brian being slain by Tommy, since that was, in a way, what had happened.

            West laughed nervously.  “I did think about doing that.  Even tried writing it that way, but it never felt right.  Patroclos is only based on the original myth.”

            Curt nodded.  “So, it’s just a rock opera of the Trojan War?”

            “No, not at all.  Achilles and Hector are both rock stars, and the movie opens with an award ceremony.  We can’t get away with using a real award, but it’s more or less a parody of the Grammy.  The award is given to Achilles, but the person on stage at the ceremony lied about who won, and the people behind the scenes are debating what to do about it afterwards.  They call Agamemnon—Achilles’ manager in this version—and explain the situation, and basically make it very clear that they intend to go public with this, no matter what he says or does.  Worried about what the public will think, Agamemnon agrees to give the award back so it can go to Hector as it was supposed to.”

            “Shit, what a dick!  If I had a manager that did that, I’d fire his ass,” Curt said, shaking his head.

            “See?  You have to be the one to play this part.”  West smiled.  “The award, you see, takes the place of Briseis, so Achilles doesn’t have to claim to be in love with her, while showering all his actual love on Patroclos.  She was never more than a prize anyway—Achilles talks about her having been awarded to him by the Greek army, so I went and made her a _literal_ award.”

            “Uh…okay…”  He bit his lip.  “And your studio is really okay with all of this?  I mean, you’re making it sound like you want your Achilles to be outright gay.”  If Curt was remembering correctly—and maybe he wasn’t—the original was more bisexual than gay.  And a lot of straight people liked to pretend he wasn’t even bisexual, that what he felt for Patroclus was just friendship.

            “I’m more or less an independent filmmaker on the whole,” West admitted.  “The studios don’t like giving money to movies that will have homosexual protagonists.”

            “Ah.”  That explained a lot.

            “Oh, but I’m actually working with a studio this time!  Not an American one, though.  People are more understanding about this sort of thing in Europe.”

            “Yeah, that’s always been my experience,” Curt agreed, chuckling.  All his best lays had been English men…but so had all his most devastating break-ups…

            “So, the thing is, this studio doesn’t care about box office name recognition, but they _do_ care about acting talent.  They’re insisting that you do a screen test before I can officially offer you the role.”

            Curt nodded.  “Like I said, I’ve never acted before.  I probably suck, so they’re right to be worried.”

            “But will you at least give it a try?”

            Curt shrugged.  “Is there money in it?”  He needed to eat, after all.

            “Not in the screen test, no.  But actors get paid.  Not as much in this case as at a big studio, but…if you write some new songs for the movie, you’ll get record sales, too.  The studio has a contract with a record label.”

            “Hmm…”  A new album was a very tempting thought.  “Tell you what.  I’ll do this screen test thing, but you have to let me write at least one song for your movie even if it turns out I really do suck and you have to give the part to someone else.”

            “That sounds fantastic!”

 

***

 

            The screen test was being held in West’s hotel suite.  Pretty swanky place; either he had a lot of money, or the studio was fucking generous about its director’s living conditions.  They’d made makeshift walls out of white sheets to give a blank room, and were shining spotlights into it, as well as pointing the camera at a CPR dummy lying on the floor.  Curt had a bad feeling about that dummy…

            But before he could ask, he found himself being given the once-over by a sniffy man in a tailored suit.  “That hair’s going to get in the way,” he commented, pointing at Curt’s forehead.

            “It’s all right, just for a screen test,” West insisted.  “We just need to get an idea, after all, not produce a finished product!”  He turned around and handed Curt a sheet of paper.  “This is the speech we’ll want you to perform.  Do you think you can memorize it, or would you prefer to be reading it off?”

            Curt shrugged, looking down at the speech.  It wasn’t long; about as many words as a single song.  “Shouldn’t be a problem,” he said, taking a seat on the couch.

            “You do understand that you’re going to be _filmed_ , don’t you?” the sniffy man asked.  “Even though you’re dressed like a bum?”

            Curt flipped him off without looking away from the speech.  He wasn’t too pleased by its contents…

            “This is _serious_ ,” a woman’s voice said.  Curt looked up at her, and saw that she was barely more than a kid.  Wearing an NYU T-shirt.  If she’d even graduated yet, she’d probably been the class of ’84.  “Performing for a camera and on stage are very different things.  You’ll be creating something _permanent_.”

            “Even before MTV, we still made music videos,” Curt reminded her.  “And TV appearances in general.  I’ve put in more time in front of a camera than you have behind one, little girl.”

            Of course, the girl objected to that, but Curt didn’t really give a shit, and let West deal with calming her down.  After that, the room fell deathly silent, until West cleared his throat.  “Ah…what do you think of the speech?”

            “It’s really….”  Curt stopped, and shook his head.  “You’re just shoving me right into the deep end here.”

            “You want a life preserver?” the girl asked, with a mocking laugh.

            “Hey, I grew up on the shores of the Great Lakes.  I swim like a fucking fish.”

            “Charming,” the sniffy man said.  “Anthony, I really do think you should reconsider.”

            “Up yours, shithead!” Curt snarled as he got to his feet.  “I can handle anything you can dish out!”

            “So you’re ready to film?” West asked eagerly.

            Honestly, Curt was more interested in beating the arrogance off that other guy’s face, but…well, that wasn’t going to repair his career any.  Especially if it turned out the rude asshole was West’s boyfriend.  That’d really put a crimp on the whole thing.  “Yeah, I’m ready.  Basically.”

            “Then if you could just kneel down beside the ‘corpse,’ we’ll get going,” West said, with a big smile.

            Curt took his position, but looking down at the thing…how the fuck was he supposed to produce anything even remotely believable?  “Do I really have to look at this nasty thing?” he asked.  “Couldn’t I just look at empty air?”

            “Actors usually perform better if they have something to look at, a placeholder for the absent person,” West insisted.

            “Yeah, but I’m not an actor.”  Curt sighed.  “All right, all right, forget it, I’ll see what I can do.  But if it’s shit, you have to let me try again without that damned thing.”  He shut his eyes, trying to block out the memory of the CPR dummy.  Given the scene…it wasn’t what— _who_ —he wanted to be thinking about, but it shouldn’t be hard to drum up the right feelings.  In his mind’s eye, he conjured up the necessary image.  That beautiful face, eyes shut in the serenity of death, the short shock of blue hair still standing on end, a bloody bullet wound piercing the holographic, skin-tight, feathered get-up…

            Everything he had felt in Berlin flooded back to the surface even after all this time—and all the further betrayals.  Yeah, he was ready now.

            “Why did you break your promise?  You said you wouldn’t go after Hector—you promised you’d come back to me!”  Curt reached out his hand towards the ashen face in his mind’s eye.  “What happened to all our plans?  How could you abandon them?  How could you abandon me?  I can’t go on alone—I don’t want to go on alone!  You’re supposed to be here at my side where you belong!”  He withdrew his hand, clenching it into a fist.  “Didn’t our vows mean anything to you?  Why would you break them to go chasing after him?”  His whole body started to feel tense, something hard and horrible welling up in the pit of his stomach.  “ _Fuck!_ ”  It erupted out of his mouth along with the word, a howl of anguish and rage twining around each other.  “I won’t let him get away with what he’s done to you.  I’ll tear that motherfucker apart—lay every piece before you as an offering.  Just wait for me this time, baby.  Don’t leave me alone again.  When he’s dead…when he’s dead…then we can be together again, yeah?”  Curt shook his head, trying to get rid of the tear he could feel trembling just at the edge of his eye.  “You’ve always been my everything—my life, my blood, my soul.  I won’t let anything part us.  Not even death.”

            It took Curt almost a minute to realize he’d run out of words to say.  He opened one eye and glanced at the script page he’d left on the dummy’s chest, and saw that he hadn’t forgotten the next line:  he’d finished the speech.  Opening his other eye as well, he glanced over at the other three, and saw that West was crying openly, and the NYU girl’s lower lip was trembling.  “How was that?” Curt asked, casually wiping at his own tears with the back of one hand, as if they meant nothing.

            “I’ve seen worse,” the sniffy guy admitted.

            “It was amazing!” West insisted.  “I’m sure the studio will be happy to have you on the project after they see that!”

            “They’d be happier to have someone with a little name recognition,” the sniffy guy countered.

            “I doubt name recognition would help a picture like this one,” the girl chuckled.  “I guarantee they’ll be pleased with the arrangement,” she added.  “Otherwise they’d run the risk of an actor who couldn’t sing.  There’s two ways _that_ can go, both of them bad.”

            “So…where does that leave us?” Curt asked, as he got to his feet.  Shit, that wasn’t as easy to do as it used to be.

            West picked up a bundled sheaf of papers off a table behind him.  “Here’s the full script,” he said, holding it out towards Curt.  “I can’t officially give you the role until the studio okays it, but please go ahead and read it over now.  So you can write some songs for it,” he added, with a wink.

            “Yeah, sure.”  Curt flipped through it, but he didn’t really know what he was looking for.  Also, it turned out screenplays looked weird.  Nothing like the script of a play.  “If it’s supposed to be a rock opera, you must have already had songs in mind?”

            “Not a rock opera,” West corrected, “just featuring rock stars.  So the songs are more…how do I put this?  Even the ones they’re performing are supposed to be pre-written, songs they’d performed many times in the past.  At the moment, I’ve put in the lyrics to songs we’d have to license, but if you want to write new ones to replace them, that would be wonderful.  As long as they match the mood of the pieces I’ve already selected.”

            “It’ll be easier if they don’t have to match lyrics you’ve already written,” Curt admitted, “but I can’t promise being able to write whole new songs fast.  I’ve got a few I’ve never recorded, though.  Some of them might work, depending on what you need.”

            “We can always use some of your old songs, too,” West added.  “All of Achilles’ songs in the script are already yours anyway.”

            So the movie was already going to be free money?  Why did he bother humiliating himself by crying over a fucking dummy, then?  No way any money men were ever going to agree to letting Curt Wild frontline their movie.

            “Personally, I see some possible costume problems,” the sniffy guy said, moving up closer to Curt and studying him all too closely.

            “My face is up here, asshole,” Curt said, not liking having this creep staring at his waist like that.

            “When was the last time you went to a gym?” the sniffy guy asked, looking up at his face.

            Curt chuckled.  “Right before I dropped out of high school.”

            His answer made the girl running the camera start giggling, but West looked concerned.  “That _could_ be a problem,” he said, nodding at the sniffy guy.  “I’ll call my personal trainer back in L.A., ask him to recommend someone in town here.”

            “Personal trainer?” Curt repeated, trying not to laugh.

            “Achilles does have nude scenes—waist up only, of course!—so we need you to be in good shape,” West insisted.

            “There’s nothing wrong with my shape,” Curt snarled.  “And there’s nothing wrong with waist down, either.”

            “Unless we want the movie released in theaters,” the NYU girl laughed.  “The MPAA doesn’t like full dong.  And neither does anyone else.”

            “Hey, I’ve got a long list of people who _love_ looking at my cock!”

            West started massaging his temples.  “She’s right about the MPAA,” he said, sounding like he was talking through strained teeth.  “Full frontal male nudity is like asking to get an X rating, especially when combined with as much bloody violence as the movie’s already going to have.”

            “I just want to know what size clothes I have to design,” the sniffy guy said.  Oh, so he was a designer?  No wonder he was so annoying.  “Fat, chubby, or normal.”

            “Fuck you, motherfucker!” Curt snarled, flipping him off.  “I can still wear all my concert clothes from ten years ago!”

            “Of course you can,” the man replied, with a patronizing smirk.

            “Please, stop antagonizing him,” West said, moving between them.  “You know perfectly well it’ll be a long time before you have to start worrying about measurements.”  He turned to look at Curt, and smiled uncomfortably.  “My concern about you needing to work out,” he explained, “is because Achilles is a—well, the original Achilles was a warrior, and we want our Achilles to have the same kind of physique to be a better callback to the myth.  You need to have some visible muscles.  Nothing over the top, of course, but at least a little definition around the pecs, and a tight, flat stomach.  Ten years ago, you were lean, but without any definition.  I’m sure you’re the same now, but we need a little more from our Achilles.  You see?”

            Curt shrugged.  “I’m not paying for a personal trainer, but if you wanna foot the bill, I’ll go along with it.”  His doctor had been pestering him to exercise more every time he’d gone in for a check-up for the last…well, he’d only _had_ a doctor for the last five years, and he’d been saying it the whole time.  Certain other individuals used to ride on him for how quickly he got winded, too…

            “Wonderful.  I know the studio will be happy to pay,” West assured him.

            The NYU girl snickered.  “Of course they will.  That’ll still be way cheaper than getting an actual star.”

            “What the fuck is your problem?!” Curt demanded.

            “I thought I was getting a job working on a real movie, that’s my problem!” the girl shouted back.  “I was expecting to be surrounded by hot chicks, and all I’m getting is gross _men_!”

            Curt grinned to stop himself from laughing.  “Yeah, all right.  I’ll accept that.”  If she was into chicks, of course she thought Curt was ‘gross.’  Unlike Brian or Jack or certain other people Curt knew, he’d never been androgynous, not even back in the days when he wore eyeliner and nail polish.

            “Now I have a lot of work to do,” West continued, with an uneasy smile.  “I have to get the footage of your test to the studio’s representative in town, so they can approve of your casting.  And I have to call my trainer, and make all sorts of other arrangements.  When I line up a local trainer for you, I’ll have him call you, all right?”

            “Sure, but when are we gonna talk about money?”  Curt was nowhere near as flush as he used to be.

            “After the studio agrees.  Don’t worry, it’ll all work out.”  With that, West hastily ushered Curt out of the suite.

            So much for being an eager fan.

            As Curt headed for the elevator, he contemplated pitching the script in the nearest ashtray.  They weren’t gonna cast him.  West had kicked him out; obviously he wasn’t good enough.

            Pretty much the only thing that stopped him from throwing it out was the thought that they still might buy a new song or two.  And he really did need the money…


	2. Chapter 2

            The day after the screen test, Curt had barely started thinking about what sort of songs to write when the phone rang to let him know that the studio had approved of his casting.  The personal trainer was already getting in touch with him an hour later, and the next day he had to meet with West and a bunch of suits to sign the contract.  Only time he’d ever had to take his shirt off to sign a contract.  They decided to give the personal trainer a month to “tone him up” before they started filming.

            Naïvely, Curt thought he’d have that month more or less to himself, giving him plenty of time to write the songs he’d signed on to write for the movie.  Instead, he kept getting called over to West’s suite to talk about his character, work on his “acting technique” and have all too many fittings with that obnoxious tailor.

            He was also called on to do screen tests for his potential co-stars, because West wanted to make sure the chemistry was right between his Achilles and Patroclos—for some reason, he spelled it with an “o” instead of a “u” like everyone else, and he kept snapping at Curt for mispronouncing it—and between his Achilles and Hector.  The screen tests for the possible Hectors were painful; they had all known they were playing a riff on Tommy Stone, and most of them had dressed the part.  Made Curt want to strangle the lot of them.

            The auditions for the potential actors for Patroclos, on the other hand…those had been great.  There were two scenes involved, one more or less standard one, and one romantic one.  It was easy to tell which actors were straight and which weren’t:  the straight ones always winced when Curt went in to kiss them.

            One of the gay ones was especially hot:  waifish physique, and a pretty, youthful face that made him look like he was barely legal, even though he was actually mid-twenties.  Kissing him practically gave Curt a boner right there in front of the camera.  It didn’t take any convincing to get him to agree to come back to Curt’s apartment afterwards for some heavy-duty fucking.  Probably not the best use of his time, but how was Curt supposed to write love songs when he hadn’t gotten laid in months?

            They got all the way to the door of Curt’s place before he realized it probably would have been better _not_ to go to his place.  He paused, key halfway into the lock.  “Hey, Elliot, listen, about my apartment…”  How was he supposed to say this?  “I’ve been real busy trying to get the songs written for the movie, so I haven’t had time to clean up in quite a while.  So don’t judge me for the trash and shit.”  Sounded like a reasonable excuse…

            Elliot laughed nervously, and nodded.  That nervous laugh was cute, but it also triggered some bad memories…

            Of course, Curt was still uncomfortable about letting anyone see his place looking like this.  Not that he normally was all that great a housekeeper, but he hadn’t really bothered with picking up—or throwing out—his trash since that last break-up.  Wallowing in literal garbage was probably not helping his mental state, but at least he hadn’t turned back to drugs.  Still, it wasn’t _that_ bad.  There were just a half dozen piles of beer bottles, and maybe a few empty pizza boxes in the kitchen.  Not like it was covering the whole floor or anything.

            While Curt was locking the door behind them, Elliot wandered away from his side, and by the time he turned around, Elliot was standing in the TV room, staring up at one of Curt’s guitars, where it was mounted on the wall.  The awed expression on his face just made Curt all the hornier for him, but before he could reach the kid’s side, he had turned around again.

            “Oh, look,” Elliot said.  “You’ve got a message on your answering machine.”

            Yeah, the fucking thing was blinking all right.  “Who cares?” Curt laughed.  “I’ll listen to it later.”  He’d only gotten it because West insisted.  Because people might call at any time on movie business, so it was important that Curt not miss any calls.  Though it turned out to be a pretty handy way to screen his calls, too.

            “It might be important,” Elliot said.  “What if it’s the director?”

            “C’mon, don’t be like that!”  Curt pulled him close, and started fondling him.  “Don’t you want to go to bed?” he whispered in the young man’s ear.

            “I won’t be able to focus with the worry of that message hanging over my head,” Elliot insisted.

            Shit.  He was one of those obsessive-compulsive types, wasn’t he?  Probably got turned off by the mess, and was looking for an excuse not to let Curt fuck him.  Resigned to it, Curt sighed and went over to the answering machine.  When he pressed the play button, the little tape inside started going, outputting that annoying low-level hiss that tapes always did.

            “When did you get one of these machines?”  Shit!  What was _he_ doing calling?!  “Curt, you’re not screenin’ your calls to avoid me, are—”

            “Son of a bitch!”  Curt started slamming the buttons as hard as he could until the player finally stopped with a slight crunching sound.  That wasn’t enough.  Just shutting him up wasn’t enough.  He yanked the cover open and pulled the tape out.  “Don’t you know when it’s over, motherfucker?!”  Curt didn’t stop screaming until he’d managed to crush the tape in his hand.

            It took Curt a few minutes to finish ranting before he could calm down.  When he did, he found that Elliot was backed up against a wall, staring at him with terror in his eyes.  Curt grimaced, and moved a little closer, but not too close.  He knew he needed to keep his distance; didn’t want to scare the kid further.  “I’m sorry you had to see that,” he said.  “You know how it is with a pernicious ex, right?”  His attempt to produce a smile felt pained even on the inside.

            Elliot nodded uncomfortably.

            “You don’t wanna do it anymore, do you?”  Not that Curt was really in the mood now, either, but he needed it more than ever.

            “Maybe…another time,” Elliot suggested.  “After you’ve had some time to unwind…”

            Curt sighed.  So much for getting laid.  “Yeah, good idea.”

            Elliot gave Curt his phone number—or gave him _a_ phone number, anyway—and fled the apartment just as fast as he could.

            Since he was suffering anyway, Curt decided to put his energy—and anger—to use, and called the trainer to set up an emergency work-out session.

 

***

 

            In the end, Elliot didn’t get the part, but he _did_ agree to go on a date with Curt despite what had happened with the answering machine.  That time they had the sense to go to Elliot’s place instead.  And he was definitely a neat freak.  Pretty good lay, though.  They dated for a while, but it was already over by the time filming started on the movie.

            Shooting a movie wasn’t really that different from shooting a music video.  It was just really fucking long.  And messier.  Curt had never had to deal with squibs and fake blood bags and all that shit before.  Pretending to shoot someone wasn’t hard—though he was really grateful that it wasn’t Hector he was shooting!—but some of the scenes of the more physical violence were actually really hard to film.  Curt was grateful they’d forced him to spend that whole month doing constant work-outs, or he’d never have had the strength to shoot take after take of some of the really brutal stuff.  And it did seem that the more over the top the violence in a scene, the more likely they were to have to film it repeatedly.

            The sense of camaraderie was very much like what Curt was used to from back in the day.  Not so much from his own tours, but it reminded him of the way Brian had bonded with his whole fucking entourage.  It would have been a nicer feeling if they’d been _Curt’s_ entourage this time.  But they weren’t:  they were Tony’s entourage.  But at least he was only interested in Curt’s skills, not in fucking him—using him up and spitting him out like a peach pit.  But this wasn’t one of those movies like back in the old days of Hollywood, where everyone was there because of the lead.  Everyone was there because of the director.

            Curt wasn’t the center of anything.

            He’d never been the sun, just another planet.

            And if he wasn’t he sun, then he wasn’t really a star, was he?

 

***

 

**Independent Film Knocks ‘Em Dead at Festival**

 

            This weekend saw the first annual Independent Filmmaker’s Alternative Film Festival right here in San Francisco.  The festival is a competitive event intended to showcase movies a little too outré for Sundance or Cannes.  Most of the movies were from first time filmmakers, starring underused television stars, Broadway bit players, or—in extreme cases—the director’s family and friends.  The standard fare at the festival ranged from excellent, quiet little stories centered around topics Hollywood wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole to well-written, ambitious movies that lacked quality in every area _other_ than their screenplays.

            The committee running the festival knew that their only chance of being taken seriously was the sole movie in their schedule that had any kind of studio backing—though it was only a very small Dutch studio—or a truly experienced filmmaker at the helm.  Anthony West has been working in Hollywood for seven years, having made one small picture with Universal (a well-regarded film adaptation of a famous play) and five independent films, usually centered on subjects regarding the gay lifestyle.  The film screened this weekend, _A Song of Warriors_ , is by far the most ambitious movie he has ever made:  a loose reinterpretation of Homer’s _Iliad_ , recasting the warriors as rock stars, and the kings as managers, producers and other behind-the-scenes types.

            Because it was the most legitimate movie on the roster, _A Song of Warriors_ was given both the opening _and_ the closing spots on the schedule, after a fashion.  They screened the first half hour at the opening ceremonies, but didn’t show the whole film until the final night of the festival.

            The press kit sent out before the festival spent a long time talking about _A Song of Warriors_ , and I am not so professional that I won’t tell you my personal reaction to the press kit.  The press kit went to extreme lengths in crowing over the movie’s casting for Achilles.  While most of the cast is made up of character actors, underused television stars, and undiscovered talent, Achilles is played by a very recognizable name from a different entertainment industry:  ‘70s rock singer Curt Wild.  Considering the character of Achilles, in this film, is a rock star, casting an ex-rocker not yet ready to relinquish the remains of his career seemed like a wise move.  But “Wild” is more than just his name:  it’s also his _reputation_.  He’s infamous for heavy drug use, over-consumption of alcohol, a legendary love affair with fellow singer Brian Slade, and for being the sort who smashes up recording studios and hotel rooms.  In short, the name “Curt Wild” is an industry byword for “lack of professionalism.”  And where is professionalism more necessary than in making a movie?

            The first half hour of the movie they teased us with at the start of the festival was truly tantalizing for those unfamiliar with Wild’s reputation.  He played the part of Achilles’ temper tantrum at losing the Bryson Award—standing in for the equally inanimate role of Briseis—with hypnotic realism.  To most of the audience, that was an enticement to come back.  In all honesty, it made me want to avoid the rest of the movie, as I was fairly sure he wasn’t acting at all, but merely being himself.

            But I’m not quite so unprofessional as to skip out on the final screening of a film festival I’m supposed to be covering!  And I have to admit to you, dear readers, that I’m glad I attended.  When it isn’t blocked by his hair, Wild’s face is marvelously expressive, drawing the audience into Achilles’ characteristic mood swings, and really forcing you to feel his despair at the death of Patroclos.  (And before you complain, dear readers, that I’m giving the plot away, allow me to remind you that _The Iliad_ has been around since some six or seven hundred years before Christ!)  His bisexual past no doubt allowed Wild to play the love scenes—yes, there are love scenes, including some very gratuitous shots of bare male posteriors—with Patroclos believably, and I think that actually helped to relieve the cringe factor in the audience, because they genuinely appeared to be in love, despite that _A Song of Warriors_ ’ Patroclos is almost more manly than Wild’s Achilles.

            To be honest, the only thing about the movie I can see that might be a deterrent to the audience is the excessive violence.  If you think you wouldn’t be able to sleep at night after watching a man bludgeon another man to death with a guitar, you probably don’t want to see this movie.  The violence is extreme, but handled realistically—unlike Homer’s original, there are no eyeballs falling out of heads and rolling around to look like bad effects work.  In fact, it’s so very realistic that it’s sometimes hard to remember that it’s all fake.  Aside from that violence, however, I heartily recommend it to everyone.  Even if you think you might be put off by the homosexual romance, you should still see it anyway.  It’s a towering work; everything about it is masterfully done, from the writing to the cinematography.  All of Achilles’ songs were written for the movie by Curt Wild—who even in his prime was better regarded as a songwriter than as a singer—while Hector’s songs (and the score) were written by veteran composer Greg Melendez, who has written songs for many of today’s biggest stars, and has even helped out Tommy Stone with his songwriting on occasion.

            Following the screening, writer/director Anthony West came out on stage to a standing ovation, and made a short speech thanking the audience for their enthusiasm, before introducing the film’s star onto the stage.  The audience was on its feet for Curt Wild even more quickly than they had been for the man actually responsible for the movie.  Surprisingly, he seemed unsure how to react to their excitement, and joked that he didn’t know how to act in front of a crowd unless he was singing and half-naked.  (For those unfamiliar with his oeuvre, Curt Wild always performs without a shirt on.)  Though the audience started chanting for a song, the MC for the festival wouldn’t allow one.

            The press was permitted a meet and greet with all the industry guests following the final screening, but only West and Wild were getting any attention, aside from a few sympathy questions asked by latecomers who couldn’t get at the stars of the show.  West seemed to become tongue-tied easily, and kept falling back on lengthy speeches (one might even call them diatribes) about gay rights and Greek mythology, sometimes intertwined.  Wild, on the other hand, seemed to be in his element, despite protests to the contrary.  Well used to swarming mobs of reporters from his time touring with Brian Slade, Wild was able to laugh off (or sometimes flip off) the hard questions, and turn the lighter ones into big jokes.  Very few people got answers to their questions—aside from the person who asked him if he thought his leather pants and coat were actually appropriate garb for a festival to which most people were wearing tuxes, who received the (possibly serious) answer that “no one would recognize me if I wasn’t wearing leathers!”—but no one seemed inclined to complain, either.

            Most of the films shown at the festival are unlikely to see wide release, but _A Song of Warriors_ will be released nationwide in a month’s time, and is likely to get some Oscar nods next spring.  Though I doubt it’ll win anything other than “Best Song.”

 

***

 

            After nearly six months of filming, promoting, and generally being dragged back and forth like a broken pull toy, Curt would have been ecstatic about getting off the plane at JFK, if it weren’t for the fact that he didn’t have any energy left to be ecstatic with.  Despite that Tony had wanted to leak his travel plans to the press, he had at least managed to come back to town incognito, so no one was waiting for him.

            Well, no one other than Mandy, but Curt had called her to ask for a ride back to his place, so that was different.  After all, she was the one who’d been keeping an eye on the place for him.

            Mandy ran up and gave him a huge hug as soon as he was in the boarding area.  “I saw the movie!” she exclaimed.  “Why didn’t you ever tell us you were a genius?!”

            “Hey, I told everyone that all the time!”  Just a certain other genius kept stepping on his toes and pushing him back into the shadows.

            Mandy laughed, and took one of his bags.  “I bet you’re being swamped with offers to make more movies.”

            Curt shrugged.  “Eh, a few.”  Well, four.  Maybe that was one too many to be just ‘a few’ but it seemed too few to be anything else.

            “Did you get an agent while you were in Hollywood for the opening?”

            “God, no.”  From what he’d heard, agents were even more annoying than managers.

            “Really?  Well, I’ll do it, then,” Mandy announced, nodding her head.

            “Fuck you!  I don’t even want an agent!”

            “Who’s going to negotiate your contracts, then?”

            “I’m not looking for a _career_ in acting,” Curt said, repressing a sigh.  “I just needed the money.”

            Mandy shook her head.  “Curt, they’re talking _Oscars_.  You can’t just walk away from those kinds of reviews!”

            “Watch me.”

            “Do you have any idea how much a major star gets for a single movie?” Mandy countered.

            “Not exactly.  Probably about the same take as from having a record go gold, I’d think.”  In other words, jack shit.  Suits didn’t like handing money over to the talent.  They wanted to keep it all for themselves.

            “If you get nominated for an Oscar, you could probably get half a million dollars for another picture,” Mandy said.  “Easy.”

            “Half…million…?”  Was that really true?  Curt had never paid any attention to that sort of thing.  Since actors had to work so much less, he had always assumed they got less than rock stars.  His salary for this picture had certainly encouraged that belief…but maybe that was just because he was new and unproven?

            “The big studios pay _ridiculous_ sums of money,” Mandy assured him.  “We’ll stop at a newsstand on the way back to your place and pick up a copy of _Variety_.  It should have some figures in it.  I bet they’ll make your jaw drop.”

            Curt opened his mouth to retort something about his jaw only dropping to take in a nice big cock, but he hadn’t gotten halfway into the second word when he realized there were a lot of little kids around.  Tony had really chewed him out for making crass jokes around kids.  Said he was giving everyone a bad name.

            They couldn’t find a copy of _Variety_ —hardly surprising, since they were on the wrong coast for it—but Mandy still kept prattling at him the whole long drive back about the idea of Curt taking on more acting jobs, with her as his ~~manager~~ agent.  Obviously, she just wanted the free money—she had never accomplished anything much with her own singing career, after all—but what if she was right?  What if he really _could_ make more money acting than singing?  Making that movie had been a lot easier than going on tour, and more fun, too…

            When they got to Curt’s place, the whole time he was trying to get his shit unpacked, Mandy was telling him about the contents of his mail—mostly bills—and all the phone messages she had written down in repeatedly emptying his answering machine.  “I’ll get back in touch with the studios about their movie offers,” she said, pocketing a few of the slips of paper with messages on them.

            “I told you, I don’t want to keep doing that.”  He was no longer sure of that, but backing down so soon would just make him look weak.

            “The Rats and some of the other musicians you’ve worked with called at various times,” Mandy went on, ignoring him, “mostly to congratulate you, but two of the Rats were pissed that you didn’t find them roles in the movie, too.”

            Curt sighed.  That was typical of them.  Though they were probably only pretending to be pissed.  It’d be hypocritical if they actually _were_ mad at him for not bringing them in on the gig, considering they were the ones who had told him they didn’t want to work with him anymore.  Of course, that was before he’d managed to kick the habit for good.

            “And you got at least ten calls from ex-boyfriends,” Mandy told him, shaking her head.  “It’s hard to be sure of the numbers, since the tape was always filled by the time I came over to check on it.  Six of those calls were from the _same_ ex-boyfriend, naturally.”

            “God, why won’t he give up?”

            “Well, what did you expect?  A kid like that, of course he can’t handle it that you got bored with him.”

            “That’s not what happened.”

            Mandy smiled sadly, and let out a deep sigh.  “It’s obvious he’s still crazy about you.  If you want my advice, you should give him another chance.  How often do you get to go out with someone _that_ good-looking?”

            “I don’t want your advice.”  Curt grimaced.  “He’ll give up soon enough.  And then he’ll probably come after you, so watch yourself.”

            “Me?”

            “Yeah.  You’re Brian’s ex, too.”

            “I really don’t think that’s going to happen.”  Mandy chuckled lightly.  “Even if it did, I’m not interested in younger men.”

            Curt shrugged.  If she didn’t believe him, fine.  She’d find out the hard way.  “Just pitch those messages,” he told her.  “All of ‘em, even the ones not from him.”

            “You don’t even want to know what they said?”

            “Why would I want to?  I’m through with them, so fuck ‘em.”

            Mandy sighed, looking at him with disapproval written all over her face.  “I’m not throwing them away.  If you don’t want to read them, I’ll just put them in _that_ drawer.”  With that, she headed into his studio.

            “Wait!  How the fuck do you know about that!?”  Curt chased after her, getting there just in time to see almost a dozen pieces of paper fluttering down into the drawer where he kept everything left over from Brian.

            “Remember about a year ago I needed to borrow a guitar string for one of the boys at the bar?” Mandy asked.  “You just told me it was in a drawer in here, but you didn’t tell me which one.  So…”  She shut the drawer again, and gave him a smirk.  “Your own fault for not being specific.”

            Curt scowled at her.  “You shouldn’t be elevating those guys to Brian’s status,” he said.  Not that one of them wasn’t nearly there already…

            “Okay, I’ll take them back out,” Mandy agreed with a readiness that Curt found deeply suspicious.  Sure enough, she only pulled out four slips of paper, not ten.  “Here.  You can at least read _these_ , Mr. Fragile,” she added, holding them out towards him.

            “If it’ll make you shut up and go away so I can get some rest, fine.”  Curt snatched the papers out of her hand.

            Instead of being insulted at being told to ‘shut up and go away,’ Mandy laughed, and patted his head.  “You must be tired; you’re getting cranky.”

            “I’m not a fucking little kid!”

            Mandy just giggled at him on the way out of his apartment.  She could be such an annoying bitch sometimes!

            There was nothing of any importance in the phone messages.  The exes where whiny and sad, and the few calls from congratulating friends and former co-workers were stupidly predictable.  Though it was amusing that Mandy had mistaken an ex for a friend:  Elliot had called, just to say that he’d seen the movie, and thought it was fantastic.  Theirs hadn’t been a great or long-lived relationship, but it was probably the best, most friendly break-up Curt had ever had.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That review encapsulates the spark that prompted this fic: I went to see a movie...uh...whenever it was, and they were running a theatrical preview for the second season of the "Fargo" TV show (yes, this was quite some time ago), that was focused on the cast, and particularly on Ewan being in it. After showing a clip of him sitting there and looking very Curt-like in hair and garb, it then showed him standing behind a couch and bludgeoning someone (or something) behind the couch. (At least, I assume it was him. The vicious movement was very fast, slightly out of focus, and I was kind of wincing as I tend to do when seeing violence.) It set the idea percolating in my brain about "what if Curt made a movie?" because I could so see him making that kind of movie. And thus his first movie here has brutal violence.
> 
> (And yes, btw, there is at least one instance of an eyeball falling out during a battle scene in the Iliad.)


	3. Chapter 3

            Curt had barely finished settling back into his apartment when Mandy came over to talk about his career.  She was really planning on going through with that whole “agent” bullshit, wasn’t she?

            “I’ve called back all the studios and directors who wanted you in a picture,” she told him, “and there’s one that…well, I don’t think you’ll like taking it, but I think it’ll be an important movie, and you’d be amazing in it.”

            “I told you, I don’t want to make any more movies,” Curt reminded her.  The sales for the soundtrack of _A Song of Warriors_ had been pretty good, so he was hoping his music career was going to get going again.  Though so far he hadn’t been contacted by any prospective new managers…

            “Why not?  On all those talk shows, you claimed you had enjoyed it, and that it was so much easier than being a rock star.”

            “Well, yeah, but…”  There was no way to explain his objections without Mandy getting on his case for being too full of himself.  There was a difference between pride and ego—Curt knew that for sure—but how was he supposed to explain that difference?  Especially to someone who didn’t even want to listen.

            “Even if you get another album made, you’ll still be in his shadow, you know.”

            “That’s below the belt.”

            “I don’t care if it is!”  Mandy crossed her arms and scowled at him, managing to look ferocious despite her usually easy-going nature.  “Brian’s never acted, and you know he never will!  Even if he tries his hand at it now, he’ll just be imitating you.”  As if Curt was the only singer in the world who had ever made a movie?  “He’ll be the one who’ll look bad.”

            Curt sighed, and sank down deeper into the sofa.  “He’d be better at it than me.”  Think how much acting he was doing 24/7 to convince the world that he was an American named Tommy Stone!

            “I doubt it,” Mandy chuckled, taking a seat on the coffee table in front of him.  “How many acts do you think he can pull off at the same time?”

            Curt shrugged.  “Who cares?”

            “Don’t you want to win?”

            “Win what?”

            “Everything.  The game of life.”  Mandy grinned, a wicked twinkle in her eye.  “Almost the first thing Brian did with his new career was to squash yours.”

            “Only because I picked a fight with him.”  How could he not have picked that fight, though?  The man who had broken his heart and nearly killed him was prancing around unconcerned, with a new career and a new face and new fans and…of course Curt had been riled into action!

            “He’d have done it even if you hadn’t provoked him.  But if you become a huge success in another industry, you’ll have well and truly beaten him, for all time.  Movies age better than music, you know.”

            That was certainly true.  People still slid copies of _The Maltese Falcon_ into their VCRs, but who listened to _music_ from the ‘40s anymore?  “I don’t like the idea of doing it just to piss off Brian.”  Not that he didn’t deserve to be pissed off.  And on.  As Tommy Stone, he deserved nothing _but_ being pissed on.

            Mandy shrugged.  “I’m sure you can find lots of other reasons to add to that.”

            “Not my point.”  Curt shook his head.  “But let’s suppose I did decide to do another movie.  What’s this offer you wanted me to accept?”  No point in continuing an argument he was losing…

            “Well, keep in mind that I already said you won’t enjoy it,” Mandy said, with a weak smile and a nervous tug at her sleeves.

            “Oh, that’s a great start.”  What could be so bad it’d make _Mandy_ nervous?  “What would I be playing, a serial killer?”  That would fit in neatly with the last picture.

            “No, you’d be playing a rock star.”

            “So why wouldn’t I like it?”

            Mandy bit her lip, and just sat there like that until Curt began to think she really planned on chewing on her lip instead of answering him.  “The movie’s about him fighting off his drug habit,” she finally said, her voice so quiet it was almost hard to hear.

            “Too close to home.”  He was clean now, but…

            “No one else could show that experience as realistically as you can.”

            “Most of ‘em haven’t lived through it,” Curt agreed.  “But I don’t think people _want_ to see that realistically.”

            “Maybe they don’t _want_ to, but I think they _need_ to.”  Mandy’s eyes held his with a powerful stare.  “If people see how awful it really is, how hard it is to get free of that curse, maybe they’ll think twice about starting in the first place.”

            “You think so?”  If he’d known what he was getting in for that first time he’d shot up, would he still have done it?  He’d just been a dumb kid at the time.  He’d never have listened to lectures and rules—he’d been ignoring plenty of both already—but maybe he _would_ have been influenced by a movie.  Something illustrative instead of pedantic…

            “Don’t you?”

            Curt shrugged.  “It’s hard to know.  But you might be right.”  And he _had_ always wanted to change the world.  Maybe helping keep other stupid kids from ever starting down that path was the best he could do on that front?

            “Can I call them back and ask for the script so you can see it?” Mandy asked.  From the tone of her voice, she _really_ wanted to.

            “I…I guess.  But look, really, you can’t be my agent.”

            “Why not?”

            “Brian’s gonna think I’m fucking you.”  No point in beating around the bush.

            Mandy laughed.  “Really, Curt, is that the best you can come up with?”

            “I’m serious!  C’mon, he’s had three managers, right?  And he was fucking two of them!”  At least, Curt assumed Tommy was fucking Shannon.  Considering how tightly glued to his side she was, he couldn’t be getting any if he _wasn’t_.  “He probably thinks it’s the standard procedure.”

            “He doesn’t think that.  But I don’t care if he _does_ think you’re fucking me.  Besides, can you think of anything that would drive him up the wall faster than thinking you’d made off with my heart?”

            Curt couldn’t bring himself to tell her that he was quite sure Brian would be more angry about _her_ making off with _his_ heart.  “I thought getting back at Brian wasn’t supposed to be my motivation for this,” he pointed out instead.

            “See, you’re already talking like an actor,” Mandy giggled.  “Motivation.”

            “Is my entire life one big joke to you?”

            “Only the parts that are funny.”

            “Get the fuck out of my apartment!”  A useless demand, since she had her own key, but…

            Naturally, Mandy was laughing as she left.

 

***

 

            True to her word, Mandy _had_ requested a copy of that screenplay.  After reading it, Curt wasn’t sure if he should take the part or not.  It was obviously based on him.  The note from the screenwriter said he’d based it on his own struggle with heroin, but…the character’s declining rock career mirrored Curt’s career in the late ‘70s too well to be coincidental.

            If he made this movie, the first thing anyone would say would be that he was playing himself.

            In the end, Mandy helped him make up his mind by getting him in touch with a clinic that specialized in getting teenagers rehabilitated from their drug addictions.  Curt went by in person to talk to the kids there—almost none of them had any idea who he was, sadly—and asked them if they would have had second thoughts about getting started with drugs if they’d known what it was really like.  A lot of them wouldn’t take him seriously, thinking that he was just the powers that be trying a new approach, but among those who _did_ believe him when he told them that he’d had things just as bad as they had, there were a lot who said they probably would have thought harder about it, or not done it at all.

            So he took he gig.

            To try and make up for old injuries, he talked the director into letting the Rats come in to play his character’s back-up band.  They barely spoke, after all, so it didn’t matter if they couldn’t act.  And acting wasn’t really needed, because they weren’t doing anything they hadn’t done for real when Curt was in his most self-destructive stages.

            Filming it wasn’t fun the way filming _A Song of Warriors_ had been.  There was fun in between—it was great patching things up with his old bandmates—but the actual filming was grueling.  Remembering just how hard it had been to completely clean up his act brought back all the old pains, and all the old urges, too.  That chemical need never fully went away, after all.

            The director, Trey Webb, suggested using sex to beat back the urges.  Said it had always worked for him.  Unfortunately, no one on set wanted Curt to have a satisfying sexual experience.  Best he could do was give in to the annoying demands of his female co-star.  Well, at least _she_ was enjoying it.  He usually managed to hit orgasm, but it didn’t really fill any of Curt’s needs.

            Strangely, it tended to be the first thing anyone asked him about on interview programs as the movie’s release date approached.  “So rumor has it that you were hot and heavy with your luscious co-star on set,” one of the late night talk show hosts said to _start_ the interview.  Curt hadn’t even wanted to go on this guy’s program.  He’d long ago nicknamed him Mr. Aggravation.  But the show was popular, and the studio had insisted.

            “No, just the chick playing the lead,” Curt replied.  That got a good laugh from the audience, but he hadn’t meant it as a joke.  There _had_ been a luscious co-star—he played a doctor at the rehab facility where Curt’s character fetched up in act two—but he’d been entirely straight.

            “It must feel good, finally being in a wholesome relationship,” Mr. Aggravation went on.

            “Actually, she was into some freaky stuff.  Bondage and shit.  Nothing wholesome about it.”  Not that Curt had agreed to go along with any of her kinks.

            The interview went downhill from there, as Mr. Aggravation kept trying to find some way to make Curt say something that would line up with the conservative ideals of the Reynolds era.  Eventually, it spiraled so far that Curt stormed off the set in a rage.  That gave the tabloids a lot to gossip about, but evidently the studio felt that there was no such thing as bad publicity, because he didn’t get in any trouble over it.

            Strangely, it was the more serious programs that gave him the better experiences.  The too-weighty talk show _True Talk_ was definitely the highlight of the whole build-up to the movie’s premiere.  The studio was chuffed that the program was willing to have Curt on at all, and the studio rep spent ages lecturing him on what he could and couldn’t say during the interview.  Of course, Curt planned on saying whatever the fuck he wanted, but he pretended he’d go along with the studio’s rules.  Easier that way.

            All the other interviews he’d had, there had been an audience and a brightly lit set.  _True Talk_ had a dark, undecorated stage, broken up only by two chairs and a table between them with glasses of water in case anyone got thirsty during the interview.  Both Curt and the show’s host—Truman Baker—were already seated in those chairs before the cameras even started rolling.  It was the only interview Curt had that _didn’t_ start out by talking about that annoying chick he’d had to fuck during filming.

            Baker didn’t even give any set-up to the cameras.  He just looked at Curt and dove right into the deep end.  “The movie’s focus is on heroin abuse,” he said, “something for which you yourself are rather infamous.  Did that influence your casting?  Or did your past influence the story?”

            “A little of both,” Curt admitted.  “Trey wrote the original script based on his own fight to get free of heroin, and when I suddenly started acting, he figured that I’d be the right person to play the part, since I’d been through it, too.  One of the first things we did after I agreed to take the part was to sit down and work out some changes to the story, working in things I went through that he didn’t, taking out things I didn’t think I’d be able to force myself to reproduce.  Stuff that was still too painful.”  A convenient meeting, because this way Curt could pretend the original script hadn’t already mirrored the late portion of his musical career, but he didn’t have to lie, either.

            “How much of the script was re-written after that meeting?”

            “I don’t think Trey would want me to say,” Curt said, with a laugh.  “Screenwriters are sensitive about things like that.”

            Baker chuckled.  “Was it difficult, emotionally, to feign a return to the life of the addict?”

            “Fuck yeah, it was difficult!  There were a lot of days I just had to stop shooting, with almost nothing accomplished, ‘cause I couldn’t take any more.”

            “Why did you agree to play the role, then?  Surely you knew it would dredge up bad memories.”

            “My first thought was to tell him I’d rather die than do it.”  Curt shook his head.  “Calling those ‘bad memories’ is an understatement, and I didn’t want to have anything to do with them.  It was Mandy who pointed out that maybe a movie like this, showing how hellish it really is living with an addiction like that, and how painful it is to drag yourself back out of the hole you’ve dug with your needles…a movie like that can maybe change a few minds, keep people from ever touching the stuff, or at least make other people understand just how hard it is, so they’ll start understanding that when you get that bad, it’s a sickness, something that needs healing, not punishing.  It’s a punishment already.”

            “Mandy?”

            Curt cleared his throat.  He’d meant to avoid mentioning her, but now that he had, might as well go all the way with it.  She’d been right that it would probably give Brian apoplexy.  “Mandy Slade.  She decided she’s going to be my agent.  Didn’t seem worth fighting with her over it.  She’s got a mean set of claws.”  He let out an uncomfortable, nervous laugh.  If there’d been an audience, they probably would have laughed at the ‘claws’ thing, but Baker was not amused.  He seemed like the type not to have any real sense of humor.

            “Mandy Slade is the wife—sorry, ex-wife—of British singer Brian Slade, isn’t that right?” Baker asked.

            “Yeah.”

            “Isn’t it odd for her to be representing your acting career?”

            “Yeah, but try telling Mandy that.  She doesn’t like to listen to other people.”  Curt shook his head.

            “Do you often spend time with Ms. Slade?”

            “I guess.  Brian put us both through the same pain.”

            “Perhaps you’d like to comment in more depth on your own relations with Mr. Slade?”

            “Not really.”

            Baker just stared at him until Curt could feel his resolve crumble.

            “Look, it was a long time ago—fourteen years since we first met—and I was…I was trying to get my life put back together.  I’d been so fucked up by heroin that I had trouble staying upright.  I’d lost my manager, basically self-destructed my whole career, and then he appeared there in front of me, bright, beautiful and offering me a second chance.  A new career, help getting my life at least a little put back together, everything.”  Curt sighed.  “I know Reynolds’ America thinks the idea of two men loving each other is the worst thing since the Bubonic Plague, but back in the early ‘70s, things were different.  Sure, it wasn’t something everyone did or accepted, but more people accepted it than you’d think, and it was a time when young people—and I was young then, too, remember!—didn’t care about or even _want_ to be accepted by the older generations.  And Brian…back then he was something really special.  Some _one_ really special.  It was hard _not_ to fall in love with him.  And I’ve never…I’ve never had any problem with the idea of sleeping with a guy, so of course I fell for him hard.  I’d never seen anyone like him before.  No one had.  There hadn’t _been_ anyone like him before, and there never will be again.”  No matter what some of Curt’s more recent exes might have wished for.

            “Slade’s manager worked very hard to publicize your affair,” Baker pointed out.  “In retrospect, and given the exceptionally theatrical nature of some of the stunts the two of you pulled, it has sometimes been suggested that there _was_ no affair, and that it was all an act.  You suddenly revealing yourself to have great acting talent lends some credence to their theories.”

            “You gotta be fucking kidding me!”  Curt slammed his fist into the table so hard that one of the legs broke, sending the whole thing falling forward onto the floor.  “Nothing in my life’s ever been as genuine as what Brian and I felt for each other!  It was—I’ve never—I’ll never know that kind of happiness again.  Brian was the best thing that ever happened to me.  Yeah, in the end he chewed me up and spat me out, but…it wasn’t like that at first.  It wasn’t that our feelings changed, it was that Brian changed.  That’s why he kicked me out, cut ties with Mandy.  He didn’t want to be Brian Slade anymore, so we all had to go.  Me, Mandy, the Venus in Furs, even that douchebag Jerry had to go in the end.  Because Brian didn’t want anyone around him anymore that still wanted him to be Brian Slade, or even Maxwell Demon.  He wanted to become someone new and different, and of everyone around him, only one person was willing to stick with him to that end.”

            “Who’s that?”

            “Quiet chick who handled the costumes,” Curt said, stifling a laugh.  “She’s his manager now.”

            “I wasn’t aware Mr. Slade was still performing.”

            “Yeah, most people aren’t.”  At least, they weren’t aware he was Brian Slade, anyway.

            “What does he think of your new career direction?”

            Curt shrugged.  “Haven’t spoken to him in years.”  Last time they’d spoken, it was backstage at the Grammies.  Curt had been performing as a memorial to an old friend who’d just died of an overdose, and Tommy had just won his first Grammy.  It hadn’t been pretty, and yet there was still something there, something in Tommy’s eyes that said part of him was still in love.  Or maybe Curt had just wanted to see that there.  “He’s probably biding his time, to see if I’m gonna self-destruct again.”

            “Are you?”

            “Not planning on it!” Curt laughed.  “I’m clean now, totally sober.  Fuck, I don’t even _smoke_ anymore.”  Maybe the only good thing that had come out of the last time he’d thought he had a serious relationship…  “It’s a lot easier to keep a career on track when you’re not being chemically addled all the time.”

            “You still drink.”

            “Well, yeah, but who doesn’t?”  Curt shrugged.  “I don’t get shitfaced anywhere near as often as I used to, though.”

            “Surely you’ve had difficulty remaining sober while mixing with the Hollywood set?”

            “There were definitely guys around on _A Song of Warriors_ that were doing lines in their dressing rooms and shit, but I never really went in for coke.  I used it when Brian wanted me to, but it wasn’t something I’d ever have done on my own.”  Curt chuckled.  “Feels like you just inhaled a bug, you know?”  Again, he was the only one to laugh at his own joke.  “If anyone was doing anything harder than that, they were nice enough not to do it in front of me.  Obviously, this time around, no one was about to admit they were using any drugs, though I’m pretty sure some of them were anyway.  And one of the changes Trey let me make to my character was to make him _not_ smoke.  My doctor would kill me if I started smoking again.”

            “It’s certainly a wise decision, from a health perspective, to lay off cigarettes,” Baker agreed, despite the fact that he reeked of them.  Curt had started noticing that smell a lot more now that he wasn’t producing it himself.  “So, do you have any advice to people trying to break off from addictions, legal or illegal?”

            “Get help.  That’d be the biggest advice I can give.  It’s the hardest thing in the world to fight something like that alone.  Back in the ‘70s, I thought I didn’t need help.  No matter how fucked up I was, I wanted to put the pieces back together myself.  The only time I was ever willing to accept help was when it was coming from Brian.  But he wasn’t really interested in getting me cleaned up, just in getting me back to the point where I could function.”  Curt sighed, shaking his head.  “Honestly, I got lucky.  After my band had finally had all they could take from me, I should have ended up in jail.  I got caught by a cop with a lot of heroin, but he took pity on me, and put me into rehab without arresting me.”  Of course, said cop was someone he’d met at a club, and had only found the heroin because they’d decided to go to Curt’s place to fuck.  If the cop had arrested him, he’d have had to explain what he was doing in Curt’s apartment at two in the morning, and he’d probably have lost his job if he’d admitted he was gay.  Besides, he was wasn’t the sort who would ever turn on someone he’d been screwing; he was a nice guy, unlike Brian and his fanboys.

            “What made you accept the help then if you wouldn’t accept it before?” Baker asked.

            “I’d hit bottom.  No career, not much money, no friends, nothing left.  And it’s not like I didn’t know I needed to break the habit.  I’d known that for years.  But it’s so much easier to just give up and keep going in the same bad rut.  Thing is, if you do that for long enough, you end up dead.  I’d prefer to think I’m a survivor.”

            “Did you need help to quit smoking?”

            Curt laughed.  “I didn’t even _want_ to quit smoking.  But my last really serious—”  He stopped suddenly, clearing his throat.  The studio guys kept going on about how he should pretend Brian was the anomaly, not the norm.  Told him over and over again that people wouldn’t want to watch him in movies if they knew he was still into men.  “—relationship,” Curt continued, somewhat weakly, “things got a little…it was like I was being cleaned up into a ‘keeper,’ you know?”  Not that that was at all what was going on, but it was an easier explanation.  “And one of the things was forcing me to quit smoking.  Supposedly for health reasons, but I think it was just that a non-smoker didn’t want to be dating a smoker.”  He shrugged.  “It annoyed me at the time, but I’m glad of it now.  I’ve been in better health since then, and I don’t get winded as easily anymore.”

            Baker nodded.  “When was this?”

            “Why?”  Maybe it was paranoid to find that question alarming, but if so, then Curt was paranoid.

            Baker smiled weakly.  “I’m being pestered to quit myself,” he admitted, “and I was wondering how long it takes for the benefits to start showing.”

            Curt laughed.  “Oh.  Well, that was the middle of 1984 when I was being pressured out of smoking.  Didn’t really start feeling any different right away, but I’m definitely in better shape now.  I guess I don’t know how much of that is the lack of cigarettes and how much is the weekly visits to the gym, though.”  He was _still_ seeing that personal trainer Tony had lined up for him.  Turned out he kind of liked being a bit more buff than he used to be.  Not enough to make his old shirts too tight or anything, just enough to have some definition.  Considering long hair was no longer acceptable in a man, it helped him feel less girly.

            “I see.  I’ll keep that in mind.”  He paused, looking at Curt critically.  “Tell me about this non-smoker who helped you to quit.”

            “No.”

            “Just one thing,” Baker insisted.

            “What thing?”

            “Male or female?”

            Shit.  He’d noticed the lack of pronouns.  “Does it matter?”

            “Not in the least.  But I’m sure the viewers are curious as to whether you’re still bisexual.”

            “None of their business,” Curt pointed out.  “I don’t ask _them_ who _they’re_ sleeping with.”

            Baker finally gave him a real smile, big and warm.  It was a knowing smile, like he was in the same place Curt was.  But it also reminded him of exactly who he was trying _not_ to talk about, so Curt had to look away pretty quickly.  God, that smile of his…it had always made Curt so fucking horny…

            Once the interview was finally over—and it had taken up almost all of _True Talk_ ’s hour-long time slot—and the cameras had been shut off, Curt asked Baker for a minute of his time.  “What is it?” Baker asked, looking at him with a curiosity he hadn’t shown during the entire interview process.

            “That person pressuring you to quit smoking,” Curt prompted.  “Male or female?”

            Baker smiled tightly.  “Does it matter?”

            “Not in the least,” Curt replied, with a grin.  So he’d been right.  No wonder the guy hadn’t wanted to talk about that chick on the set…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Technically, I shouldn't have used "True Talk" for the name of the talk show, because that was the name of a talk show in "The Truman Show," but the random name generator I used to create names for the OCs gave me "Truman Baker" and it seemed like such a good name for a serious talk show host, and the show name was just too perfect a fit to pass up...


	4. Chapter 4

            It was two days until the movie was set to open, and Curt was getting packed for the trip to L.A. for the premiere.  He’d been absorbed in planning what to take—and preparing what to say if anyone pressed him for an interview—all day, to the extent that he hadn’t so much as poked his head out the door, or turned on the television.  But about dinner time, he sat down on the sofa and finally switched on the tube.  The local news was playing; never his favorite, so he still had the remote in hand when the story caught his attention.

            “And although the White House has continued to deny the accusations printed in this morning’s _Herald_ , sources close to President Reynolds have begun to admit that at least some of the accusations against the Committee for Cultural Renewal are correct,” the anchorman was saying.

            The _Herald_?  That was…

            “Our man on the street went by the _Herald_ offices to ask some questions regarding the story’s sources.”  The picture on screen changed to a dingy office flooded with the unnatural light of the news cameras.  And sitting at his computer, wearing those ugly glasses of his, trying to ignore the cameras aimed at him…

            “Mr. Stuart!” a voice shouted from off-camera.  “Who are your sources for the story?  Where does your information come from?”

            It took five more questions along those lines before Arthur finally turned to look at the cameras, looking really pissed off—a look Curt had never seen before.  “You know a journalist can’t reveal the identity of his anonymous sources!  Without that discretion, they wouldn’t ‘ave agreed to divulge their information in the first place!”  After speaking, he got up and started walking away, but the shot switched back to the newsroom almost immediately.  Probably a good thing.  Watching that ass was…

            Back in the newsroom, the anchorman shook his head, looking disappointed.  “The only source identified by name in the article was popular singer Tommy Stone, who has often in the past promoted the committee’s agenda.”  A picture of Tommy’s face appeared behind the anchorman.

            “Son of a bitch!” Curt shouted, throwing the remote at the television.  “Goddamned motherfucking whore!”

            The remote striking the screen didn’t turn the TV off, so the anchorman was still talking about that fucking egomaniac.  Curt tried throwing his beer can at it, but the can was empty, so it had even less effect.  He threw everything he could reach.  Only when he pulled a drawer out of the end table and threw it did the TV finally shut the fuck up.

            With only the sparking and fizzing of the broken vacuum tube after the TV crashed to the floor behind the entertainment center, Curt had nothing to distract him from the fury pounding through his veins.

            He’d finally gotten what he wanted, hadn’t he?

            He couldn’t _be_ Brian, so he’d done the next best thing and _fucked_ him, hadn’t he?

            “Fucking motherfucker!” Curt screamed at the broken television.  “You two deserve each other, shitheaded bitch-queens!”

 

***

 

            As if they _wanted_ to torture him, no one at the premiere was talking about the movie, aside from a few weak words of congratulation.  Instead, all they wanted to talk about was the Committee for Cultural Renewal.  As if they hadn’t all known all along that it was the fucking Thought Police.  Even worse, they all wanted _Curt_ to talk about it, too.  Because they thought—for some reason—that his feud with Tommy Stone must have somehow had some connection to Tommy’s work with the Committee for Cultural Renewal.

            Every time they asked, he wanted more and more to tell them the truth.  To explain that Tommy Stone was really Brian Slade.  That Curt had gotten in that fight with him because he’d been so disgusted by how far the former love of his life had fallen.

            But how could he tell them that?

            Even if the committee really was going to be toppled by Arthur’s article, that didn’t mean they were the only protectors of Tommy’s secret.  He had his own private bodyguards, not to mention Shannon’s obsessions.  She’d probably take out a fucking hit on Curt if he told anyone the truth.

            Half an hour into the reception after the premiere, Curt was already losing it.  He’d lost track of how many drinks he’d had.  They weren’t helping, anyway.

            It was maybe fifteen more minutes before he finally snapped.

            Some jackass came up to him and didn’t even try to grease the conversation wheels with a fake word of praise for the movie.  He just launched into a fucking buttload of questions about Tommy Stone and the Committee for Cultural Renewal.

            “Shut the fuck up!” Curt shouted at him.  “Tommy Stone isn’t the goddamn star of this picture—he’s nothing to do with it, or me!  You wanna talk about Tommy fucking Stone?  Then go talk _to_ him!  He’s his own favorite topic of conversation anyway!  Go talk to him and his bitchy new sex toy!”

            He could feel everyone staring at him.

            Why were they all taking this asshole’s side?

            This night was supposed to be about Curt, not Brian!  It wasn’t even _Brian_ they wanted to talk about—it was his horrible new alter ego!

            They were the ones being insensitive pricks.  Why was it somehow Curt’s fault for pointing that out?

            Screaming obscenities at them for their rude shortsightedness, Curt stormed out of the party and went to the nearest bar to drink himself into oblivion.

 

***

 

            The one thing Curt had made abundantly clear in all his interviews was that if he made another movie, he wanted it to be something more fun.  The kind of thing he’d actually want to _watch_.  The kind of ordinary popcorn movie people could go to on dates and not end up feeling awkward about.

            The offers did not exactly come pouring in.

            Mandy insisted that was Curt’s own fault for having made such a scene at the premiere.  And maybe she was right.  He still told her to fuck off, of course.

            He didn’t get any offers from management companies looking to represent his singing career, either.

            So that was how it was, huh?  Brian or Tommy, he always had to be queen of the industry.  No one else got a chance.  No one was allowed to talk bad about him.  And anyone who crossed him just fell off the face of the earth.

            Well, fine.  Curt had made enough money off this second movie and the two soundtracks that he could live for a couple of years without working, as long as he didn’t do anything extravagant.  Without drugs or cigarettes, his daily costs were a lot lower than they used to be, after all.  And if he wasn’t having to make public appearances, he wouldn’t have to buy new clothes anymore.

            He had just resigned himself to returning to permanent anonymity when an offer _did_ finally come in.  Mandy came over in person to tell him about it, which might have seemed like a danger sign, except she’d been coming over almost every day for the past month.  She probably thought that if she didn’t watch him like a mother hen, he’d start shooting up again.

            “It’s not much of a part, really,” she told him, looking at some notes jotted on a pad of paper, “but it’s the kind of popcorn movie you were talking about earlier.”

            “Action movie or romantic comedy?”  Curt was pretty sure he couldn’t do a romantic comedy.  Or any other kind of romance.  He was too fucking bad at romance.

            “Action movie,” Mandy replied, much to his relief.  “But, Curt…they want you to play the bad guy.”

            “Really?”  Curt looked up at the ceiling, idly inspecting the crack he’d never gotten around to having someone fix.  “He’s got that much hold on an industry that he’s not even part of that just talking a little shit about him’s turned me into a villain?”

            Mandy laughed.  “I don’t think this is Brian’s doing.  But you started screaming at people at your own premiere.  Hollywood doesn’t like that kind of behavior.  They don’t understand what you and I go through every time we hear the name ‘Tommy Stone.’  As far as they could tell, it was just the temper tantrum of a prima donna.”

            Half a laugh escaped through Curt’s lips, despite his best attempts to stop it.  “A prima donna, huh?  Fuck, now _I’m_ turning into Brian?”

            “That’s not funny.”

            Curt shrugged.  He wasn’t sure it was supposed to be funny.  “So what’s the movie like?”

            “Hard to say without seeing the script,” Mandy admitted.  “But it sounds like there’s a bit of mystery involved as to who the villain is.  They said that for most of the movie you’re just a rock star, and it’s sort of a bait-and-switch thing when it turns out you’re actually the mastermind behind everything.”

            “Huh.”  He shook his head.  “Kind of weird.  But it sounds easy to film.”

            “It would be,” Mandy agreed.  “Being a supporting character rather than the lead, you’ll probably only have half an hour of screen time.  Much less work involved.”

            “What’s the money like?  And they’ll let me write my own songs, right?”

            “They didn’t say,” Mandy said.  “On either count.  But they did claim the pay would be ‘good.’  Whatever that means to them.”

            “It can’t hurt to ask for more information.  I wouldn’t mind having more money in the bank.  And life’s a lot less shit if I’m working.”

            Mandy smiled.  “That’s a good point,” she agreed.  “I’ll ask them about the money and have them send a copy of the script.”

            “The money and the songs.”  He’d get a lot more residuals from soundtrack sales than he would from sales of video cassettes of the movie.

            “What if they don’t want to let you write the songs?” Mandy asked.  “You’re not going to refuse to take the part, are you?”

            “No.  But I’ll be a lot happier if I can sing my own songs.”  Curt tried to smile, but it didn’t feel like it had actually worked.  It felt tight-lipped and flat.  “As long as they don’t ask me to lip sync to someone else’s recordings, I’m fine with it.”

            Mandy laughed.  “God, I hope no one would do anything that stupid!”

 

***

 

            In the week or so Curt spent waiting for the script to the action movie to arrive, nothing really happened in his own life, but things were buzzing all over the political landscape.  Congressional subcommittees had been formed very quickly in response to Arthur’s exposé about the Committee for Cultural Renewal, but for a long time it looked like nothing else was going to happen.  The day after Mandy called the studio back, one of those subcommittees finally made its public report, making it very clear that not only was the Committee for Cultural Renewal committing violent crimes in its censorship activities, but President Reynolds had been personally aware of everything they were doing.

            Reynolds spent two days vehemently denying it before the impeachment proceedings started.  From that day forward, no one on the streets was talking about anything else, which made for a good reason to stay home.  Not that Curt wanted to see Reynolds remain in office—that was the last thing he wanted!—but no one seemed capable of mentioning it without somehow bringing up Arthur, one way or another.  That was just too stressful.  It had been bad enough before, but now that he, too, had utterly abandoned his principles and climbed aboard the Tommy Stone bandwagon…

            By the second day of the impeachment proceeding, Curt was only leaving his apartment to get his mail.  Food could be delivered, but the mail stopped at the first floor, and he wasn’t about to ask Mandy to get it for him.  Too much chance she’d read it.

            When he got back upstairs, Curt looked through the small bundle of mail.  A few forwarded ‘fan’ letters that had been sent to movie and recording studios.  They probably weren’t from actual fans at all, but reporters trying desperately to get a statement from him.  He’d deal with them later.  Some bills—there were _always_ bills.

            And one more letter from a reporter.  A reporter who used to pretend to be a fan.

            Curt tore it in half as soon as he saw that familiar handwriting on the address.  He didn’t even need to see Arthur’s name on the return address to know it was from him.

            Looking at the two halves of the letter on the floor by his feet, the guilt started to creep in again.

            The first time, he’d burned the letter.  The second time, it went in the garbage disposal, which had ended up with Curt calling the plumber, because garbage disposals weren’t meant for that kind of thing.

            But since then…he’d tossed them in the trash a lot of times, and always fished them out again.

            It was pretty rare for one of Curt’s exes to look back at him.  Most of them seemed so fucking glad to be rid of him.  No matter what he had done, despite how badly he had betrayed Curt…the sheer fact that he hadn’t just walked off without a backwards glance was _different_.  He wasn’t quite like the others.  Even Brian had never looked back.

            Glumly, Curt stooped and picked up the two halves of the letter.  He took them into the back room and dumped them in the drawer with the others.  They were forming a small white blanket now, in between Curt and everything Brian had left behind.

            That would probably fucking _thrill_ Arthur if he ever found out.

            Though now that he had his hands on the real Brian, maybe he wouldn’t even care.

 

***

 

            The script arrived the same day the House of Representatives impeached President Reynolds.  Curt actually had the news on while he opened up the envelope with the script in it, listening to Reynolds making an idiotically naïve speech about how he was convinced that the Senate was smarter than the House, and would never convict him of impeachment.

            “And once I’m cleared of these treasonous lies,” Reynolds insisted, “I’ll be prosecuting to the fullest extent of the law the foreign criminal responsible for this outrage!”

            “Not with Tommy Stone protecting him,” Curt snarled, shutting the TV off again.

            Fuck.  What was it about that guy?

            Even though Curt knew Arthur had a new protector now, something about knowing the President of the United States was gunning for him made Curt want to go find him, and shelter him from the danger.  Despite that Arthur had never had any real interest in him—that he’d only ever been interested in Brian.  Despite that he was now _with_ Brian.  Despite that he could probably protect himself pretty well, considering he was a couple inches taller than Curt, and three years ago had been at the same level of lean and toned that Curt was now.

            But Arthur was always being protected by some fucker or other; whoever he was bending over for at the time.  When they’d first met, it had been the Flaming Creatures.  Arthur claimed they’d been the first, but Curt wasn’t sure he believed that.  For the man to be so used to trading sex for protection, he’d probably been doing it since he was a kid.  Maybe he got his start as young as Curt did.  Maybe even in the same way…

            No, he didn’t want to think about it like that.  The last thing he wanted was to start feeling sorry for Arthur.  The man didn’t deserve it.  He was a parasite, taking advantage of those around him, telling them he loved them when he really only loved _Brian_.  Let him suffer.  He _deserved_ it.

            To distract himself, Curt put everything he had into reading the script, forcing himself to visualize every scene.  Though that was a little difficult since he didn’t know who had been cast in any of the other roles.

            It was going to be a really dumb movie.

            A chest-thumping, ultra-macho “America First!” type of movie.

            The hero, Sammy Rock, undergoes a series of attacks by terrorists—or criminals or whatever they’re supposed to be—all dressed up in period costumes of America’s enemies, starting with British redcoats, and moving up through WWI and WWII Germans into 1950s Soviet sailors.  He doesn’t know who’s behind the attacks, and keeps looking for an answer, until he finally follows the Soviet-dressed attackers back to their hideout, and discovers that America’s most popular rock star is actually a false front for a spy from an unexplained foreign enemy that sounded like it was half Russian and half Middle Eastern.

            While he liked the idea of playing America’s most popular rock star, Curt couldn’t help feeling that the role had been written with Tommy Stone in mind.

            Honestly, that was pretty much the only thing about the script that made him want to do it.

            After she read the script, Mandy was 100% opposed to him taking the gig.  It was going to pay pretty sweet money—of which she’d get 15%—but she insisted that the damage to Curt’s dignity would be too great.  Curt reminded her he didn’t _have_ any dignity, and told her that if she wouldn’t call the studio back to tell them he’d take it, then he would.  So she told him he was a brainless Neanderthal and made the call.  Because she might be principled, but she wasn’t stupid.  15% of $750,000 was a lot of money.

            The studio’s lawyers arrived in New York with the contract on the same day the Senate convicted Reynolds of impeachment.  While Curt was signing the contract for his ludicrously over-patriotic third movie, Reynolds was cleaning out his things from the White House, and DAs all over the country—but especially in Washington—were setting wheels in motion to have the suddenly ex-President in court on criminal charges for his many and grotesque crimes against the people and the state.

            Curt tried not to pay much heed to the coverage of the country’s first-ever full impeachment, however.  There was all too much mention of Arthur in that coverage.  He, by himself, was the new Woodward and Bernstein, and everyone was hailing him as such.  Including, apparently, Woodward and Bernstein themselves, which seemed a little twisted to Curt’s way of thinking.

            He had expected he’d get to the process of filming the new movie soon, but the studio reps disappointed him greatly by explaining that pre-production on a big budget action flick like this one was a lengthy process, and he wouldn’t be expected on set for at least six months.  It gave him plenty of time to write his songs, but he only had three of them in picture.  They were willing to let him write another for the end credits, and maybe another to be put on the soundtrack despite not being in the movie, but four or five songs wasn’t much to fill up six months.  And the showdown, as written, wasn’t going to involve much in the way of physical fighting on his end, so he didn’t need to spend the time getting any more fit than he already was, or to learn martial arts or anything like that.

            It wasn’t until 1988 that filming finally started.  Before it did, though, the year started with a real shock, because in mid-January Tommy Stone suddenly got married to Shannon.  Curt had no idea what the fuck was up with that.  Did she catch him fucking Arthur or something?  But she’d always known about the relationship between Brian and Curt, and she’d never seemed to care, so that didn’t seem very likely.  Surely Arthur didn’t decide that with his newfound celebrity, he no longer needed Brian either, and Tommy was marrying Shannon on the rebound.  That didn’t seem like _any_ of them.  Maybe it was just a beard, because someone was starting to figure out that Tommy liked to fuck men.  That was the only explanation that made any sense to Curt.

            Principal photography on the new movie, _Rock of Retribution_ , actually started in late February, but Curt wasn’t called onto the set until late March.  The first day he was there, he sat down with the other actors around a big table and they just read over all his scenes, to familiarize themselves with the material—even though Curt had long since memorized the scenes out of sheer boredom!—and with each other.  The main thing he learned from those read-through’s was that his co-star, Rex McLeod, was a lazy piece of shit who didn’t even seem to have _read_ the scenes until that moment.  He also had so much trouble getting the words out correctly that Curt was seriously thinking he might be dyslexic.  He was going to have to ask someone about that;  if he _was_ , then it wouldn’t be right to get on his case about his utter failure to be able to read correctly, but if he _wasn’t_ , then Curt was not about to cut him even the least bit of slack.

            After the read-through, when everyone else left the meeting room for a smoke or a coffee or god-knows-what, Rex came over to him, grinning from ear to ear.  And it wasn’t a “happy to meet my idol” kind of grin.  It was an “I’m gonna kick up so much trouble that I’ll make Tom Sawyer look like a fucking saint” kind of grin.

            “Glad to finally meet my co-star,” he drawled, extending a lazy hand in Curt’s direction.

            “Yeah, same,” Curt said, trying to sound like he meant it.  This guy wasn’t even good-looking, and his body was only so-so.  Why was he such a big action star?

            “So, it may be a little early to purposefully step on a landmine, but it’s not like we’re supposed to get along anyway,” Rex went on, his grin getting positively malicious.

            “Don’t step on any landmines.  Really.”  Curt did his best to fight off a grimace.  He didn’t want the bad press—and possible jail time—that would result if he started beating McLeod and everything else in sight to pieces with a metal folding chair.  But the chairs were handy, and he was already feeling pissed off at this guy…

            “But I just gotta know,” McLeod said, as if he hadn’t even heard Curt, “what the deal is between you and Tommy Stone.”

            “Why would I have struck a deal with Tommy Stone?”  Maybe if he pretended he misunderstood the question…  “We don’t get along.”

            “Exactly!  See, I was at his wedding,” McLeod said, leaning in close and putting an arm around the tops of Curt’s shoulders, as if they were great friends, “and the bride, she was quite the chatterbox.”

            That didn’t fit any of Curt’s recollections of Shannon.  He’d barely heard her speak more than three words at a time in the year and a half he’d been with Brian.  “What’s that got to do with me?”  Surely she wouldn’t have gone around talking about everything she had seen back then.  Not at her own wedding to the other man in the relationship.

            “I don’t know!  That’s what I want to find out!”  McLeod laughed all too loudly, right in Curt’s ear.  “Mostly, she was bitching about that reporter.  You know, the one who pinned the target on poor old Reynolds.”

            “Poor old Reynolds?” Curt repeated, appalled.  “The man’s a criminal.”

            McLeod finally let go of Curt’s shoulders, and shrugged, spreading his hands to either side of his body.  “That’s what they claim.  But there’s no way for us to know that, is there?”

            “Yeah, there is.  Believe me, I used to get strong-armed by the Committee for Cultural Renewal myself.  Reynolds is a—”

            “Anyway, so the thing is, Tommy’s little woman, she seemed to think you were involved somehow.”

            “Involved with who?”  There was no way that Arthur—or Tommy—would have told her that Curt and Arthur used to have something going on.  Hell, Arthur probably hadn’t even told _Tommy_ that.

            “The blackmail, of course!”

            “Blackmail?  What the fuck are you talking about?  Are you stoned?”

            McLeod laughed, and patted Curt on the shoulder.  “You tell me, man.”

            “I have literally no idea what you’re talking about.  Who’s blackmailing who?”

            “According to Tommy’s missus, that limey reporter blackmailed Tommy into helping him with his story.  She seemed to think it was something to do with that fight you and Tommy got into early in Tommy’s career.”

            Curt was so stunned that for a minute he couldn’t even think, let alone respond.  “You mean…he wasn’t fucking him?”  The idea had never even crossed his mind.  How could Brian have met a man as pretty as Arthur without wanting to fuck him?

            “What the—fucking?  Who?  What?!”  McLeod leapt at least a foot backwards away from Curt, as if he was covered in jumping acid bugs.

            Curt shrugged, with a laugh.  “I figured Tommy wouldn’t have played Deep Throat unless he was getting some deep throat, if you know what I—”

            “That’s disgusting!  Who’d want that from a _dude_?!”

            “Welcome to the real world,” Curt chuckled.  “Haven’t you even seen what the reporter in question looks like?  He’s gorgeous.”  Definitely the most beautiful man Curt had ever fucked…

            McLeod backed away further, his eyes wide and crazy.  “You…are you a fag?  You’re not, right?  You like chicks, don’t you?”

            Curt sighed.  “Of course I like women,” he said, with a smooth smile.  In retrospect, it never should have surprised him that he would have some acting talent.  He’d gotten so good at lying just in his everyday life, after all…

            McLeod let out a deep sigh of relief.  “Thank God!  You scared me for a minute there.”

            Curt did his best to laugh, but the conversation had him worried all day.  If McLeod was typical…now was probably the worst possible time for anyone to figure out that he was still the same person he was back in the ‘70s, minus the drugs.  There was nothing for it but to start fucking some girl, and make sure everyone knew he was doing it.  And, since Rex McLeod was famous for seducing his lead actresses, Curt decided the lead actress on this picture was the ideal choice.  Get a little payback against for McLeod being such a disgusting excuse for a human being.

            Turned out to be incredibly easy to score with her, because McLeod had already been trying to get in her pants, and she hated his greasy guts.  In fact, she was practically seducing Curt before he even got to the point of figuring out the best way to ask her out.  Even for a fake relationship, it wasn’t much of anything, but at least she was actually fun to hang out with; it turned out they liked a lot of the same books and movies, and she claimed she enjoyed his music.  Still, it was over by the time Curt went back to New York.  No point in dragging things out.

            When he got home, he found that Mandy had sorted his mail for him; she called it a service to help justify her 15%.  She had paid the bills—using his money, of course—and thrown away the junk mail.  So all that was left over were the few personal letters from people Curt actually knew, and the fan mail.

            In among those letters was another one from Arthur.

            Curt put it in the drawer _without_ tearing it in half.


	5. Chapter 5

            _Rock of Retribution_ didn’t open until Christmas, and it got the expected terrible reviews and great box office.  There were only two things about the movie that were actually praised:  the songs and Curt’s performance.  Though he was pretty sure only half of that praise was genuine.  People were still talking about him as giving great performances because their expectations were still colored by what he’d been like at his lowest points in the ‘70s.  Once they got used to thinking of him as a capable professional, the good reviews would cease.  Which probably meant he should milk them for everything they were worth in the meantime.  As soon as the reviewers realized he wasn’t actually very good, he’d start getting paid a lot less, if he could even get any more acting gigs at all.  He needed to earn enough money— _after_ taxes—to live on for the rest of his life.

            With that in mind, he called Mandy, and told her he wanted to start taking more acting gigs.  She was reluctant at first, until he explained why.  “When did you start planning for the future?” Mandy asked, with a laugh.  “I thought you wanted to die young.”

            “Too late for that, isn’t it?”  He was already past forty, for fuck’s sake.  Young went away a long time ago.

            Mandy’s laugh was uncomfortable.  After all, she wasn’t that much younger than he was.  “I’ll see what I can do,” she told him, “but I can’t make offers materialize out of thin air.”

            “Yeah, I know.  Just do what you can.  I’ll talk to a few people, too.”  He’d made friends with some producer-types, and fucked a few more.  Between them and Mandy’s contacts, Curt was sure _something_ would happen.

            And it _did_ happen, almost immediately.  He was sent an offer to make an ensemble cast comedy about a group of ‘wacky’ American tourists on a package tour of Europe who stumble into all sorts of ‘zany’ adventures, including an attempted coup in a fictional European nation in a sequence that was ripped straight out of _The Great Race_.  It was the first gig Curt had been offered where he _wasn’t_ playing a rock star.  His role was that of a recently divorced desk jockey who was a big fan of ‘60s rock, and frequently burst out into song, typically to fill in a montage.  It wasn’t the best role in the picture, but it wasn’t bad, and if they actually licensed the songs listed in the script, he’d get to sing a lot of Doors songs, among others that were a bit less up his alley.  It wasn’t that he disliked the Beatles or the Beach Boys, as such, but their music was just too damned cheerful for him to feel any connection to it.

            It was an unimpressively mediocre script—some of the jokes were trying way too hard, but they’d probably end up replaced with an improvisation, or on the cutting room floor—that would have some spectacular visuals, since they were planning on filming everything on location.  The kind of movie where the cast was the real “make it or break it,” and the studio claimed they’re already signed several very talented people, which was the only promising thing about the picture’s prospects.

            But probably the real reason Curt decided to take it was that one of the people the studio claimed they’re already signed was a really hot young actor who was well known—among the Hollywood set, not the general populace—to be gay.  The chance of fucking him was too good to pass up!

            Unfortunately, a month later, when filming began, Curt learned that the studio had lied to him:  they had only been in talks with the young stud, and he had ultimately chosen to sign on with another picture instead.  Still, the cast was a promising one.  Though the tourists were all supposed to be American, about half of them were being played by British actors, and a lot of them were the right age to have been Curt’s fans back in his heyday.  In fact, on the first day they were all together, at least three of them had taken an opportunity to tell him which of his concerts they’d attended, and how many of his records they still had.  That did a lot to help repair the damage from the kids playing the obnoxious teenagers on the trip, who hadn’t even known Curt used to _have_ a musical career.

            One of those kids—just barely eighteen—was almost as beautiful as Arthur had been back in ’75, and he always seemed to be giving Curt the same bedroom eyes Arthur had.  Every time Curt found himself looking at that kid, he had to look away.  Sure, it was technically legal, but…god!  Curt’s second record came out about the same time that kid was born!

            In the end, he had to start fucking one of their other co-stars to try and release some of the pressure.  One of the women about his own age had been all over him, so it had been a simple thing to give in to her advances.  He really hated himself for it, though.  She seemed to be serious about him, but he had trouble remembering her name half the time.  In fact, he sometimes fumbled and called her the wrong thing entirely.  Typically, he tried to cover by making some half-assed joke that he’d had to cut off half his brain for the part.  Since she had liked his long hair, she usually accepted the excuse.  Curt was more bitter about the studio insisting on him cutting his hair short than he was about being forced to screw some irritating woman just to keep his dick on enough of a leash to keep it out of that kid’s ass.  Why couldn’t his character have just been a desk jockey with the balls to have long hair?  Surely there were _some_ people with a sense of individuality in the corporate world!

 

***

 

            Curt’s career fell into a curious sort of a routine after that picture.  He was making two or three pictures a year, and although most of them didn’t give him any opportunity to sing in the movie, they all let him write and perform a song for the end credits.  And during each one’s filming, he was careful to get prominently involved with some chick or other on set—not always an actress, sometimes she was an assistant director, or an associate producer or god-knows-what—so people didn’t begin to suspect anything.  It wasn’t uncommon for him to secretly also be having something going on with one of the men on set, too, but so far no one seemed to have caught on to that.

            With being so busy, he didn’t have much time to turn on the television anymore, but it seemed like whenever he did, there was always some interview program on, talking to one of his exes.  Either they’d be interviewing Tommy, in which he would always lament having been “forced” to turn against President Reynolds and the Committee for Cultural Renewal, or they’d be interviewing Arthur about Tommy, Reynolds, or…Curt didn’t even know what else they interviewed him about.  It was hard to listen to the words, somehow.  He just listened to the tone of Arthur’s voice, the sad inflections, the pain that sometimes wracked him.  Why?  What did he have to be upset about?  Wasn’t he on top of the world right now?

            It wasn’t as though he was still the same pitiful ex he had been a few years ago.  He hadn’t even tried to contact Curt in ages.

            Sometimes Curt found himself in his studio, staring into the drawer filled with his regrets.  Once in a while, he let his fingers brush across the dusty love gifts Brian had left him with, or trace the torn edges of the remains of one of Arthur’s letters.  But he couldn’t bring himself to pick up any of those shattered memories.

 

***

 

            The call must have come in around Thanksgiving.  It was hard to be sure, because Curt had been on location for a disastrous example of a disaster movie, and Mandy tended not to write dates on her phone message slips, just things like “Saturday, after lunch,” or “Thursday, while I was shopping.”  Hard to blame her for being scatterbrained about mundane things like his phone messages, though.  She’d finally found a new relationship, after all.  Kind of a weird one, since it was with two other people, but…hey, if it worked for them, that was what mattered.

            Beau Burris was one of those cinematic auteurs who generally made two unwatchable ‘artistic’ movies for every one movie he made that people could actually go see.  Audiences never knew how to react to his name at the front of a trailer, but anyone in the industry knew to start salivating on hearing he wanted to work with them.  He was viewed by many as a shortcut to an Oscar.  Curt didn’t care about awards—other than the Grammies—but he was flattered to have gotten a call from someone so prestigious, so he decided to call back himself, rather than have Mandy find out what he wanted.  He probably only wanted one of Curt’s songs, but it was still better to call in person.  Besides, Burris was known for fucking almost everything that moved, and he wasn’t bad-looking, so there might be a nice lay in it, if nothing else.

            As soon as Curt identified himself, Burris let out a long stream of excited, incomprehensible words.  The verbal equivalent of wetting himself.  Once he finally calmed down, Curt asked “So, what did you want to talk to me about?”

            “It’s about a movie I have in the planning stages,” Burris explained.  “We’re calling it _Danger Zone_.”

            Curt couldn’t fight off a grin.  How often was a movie named after one of his albums?  That was his favorite album, too.  “So, are you just looking to license the songs, or…?”  He didn’t want to sound like he was expecting to be handed a role, even though he absolutely was.

            “We probably only want one or two of the actual songs,” Burris replied.  “It’s more that the story was inspired by the thematic material of the lyrics.  Mostly the lyrics of ‘Gimme Danger,’ but some of the other songs as well.”

            “Good choice.”  No matter what else had happened since, Curt couldn’t think of that song without remembering that beautiful night on the rooftop…

            “Obviously, we’ll be giving an ‘inspired by’ credit to you as the songwriter, but we were also hoping you might play the lead,” Burris said.

            Curt chuckled.  “It’d be rude not to, wouldn’t it?”  He bit his lip a moment.  “Who’s ‘we,’ by the way?  I thought you tended to work alone?”  Burris was the type to film on his own money until it ran out, and only then get some funding from a studio, when there was little to no room for them to demand any kind of control.

            “Me and the screenwriter,” Burris explained.  “My lover.”

            So much for getting laid.  “Gotcha.  So, tell me about the story.”  No point in getting upset about it.  “There’s a lot of places you could take those themes.”  Also, at least half the lyrics had been written more by the drugs than by Curt, so even he didn’t really know what they were about.

            “It’s a story of love, loss and redemption,” Burris said.  That only described about half the serious stories ever told.  “The setting is the late Roman Empire, but it’s more a thematic setting than a historical one.  We open with a young man who runs away from torment and abuse to make his way alone in the world.  By the time he’s an adult—that is, when we switch over from the boy in the prologue to you in the movie’s present—he makes his living with various criminal acts.  After a drunken mishap, he’s arrested and made to pay for his crimes by being enslaved to the same noble family he tried to rob by attempting to seduce the wife.  At first, he’s chafed by his enslavement, but he comes to care for the members of the family in the same way they care for him:  the husband he tried to cuckold is always berating and beating him, so he detests the man, but the wife is sweet to him, the teenage children both fall in love with him, and the small child begins to look at him as a second—and much nicer—father.  Then the barbarians invade, and in the slaughter, the parents, servants and most of the other slaves are killed.  But our hero and the three children escape the burning villa alive, and he decides to take them back to his own barbarian homeland to protect them.  Of course, the fact that brother and sister are both competing for his sexual love, while the small child just wants a new parent causes considerable complications.”

            “Yeah, it would.”  Was he going to have sex scenes with two teenagers?  Curt wasn’t entirely sure he was comfortable with that.  If for no other reason than that it would be front page news if he got a hard-on for the boy instead of the girl.

            “In the end, of course, the three children begin to represent different aspects of life.  Sexual pleasure, reproductive fertility, and family.  It comes down to making choices between those things, and deciding which one he wants to dedicate his life to.”

            “Dedicate his life _to_ , or sacrifice his life _for_?”

            Burris coughed.  “Too predictable?”

            “A little, yeah.  It better have been for the kid, not one of the teens he’s fucking.”

            “It was,” Burris assured him.  “But perhaps the ending could use a little work…”

            “Probably.  There’s nothing like that in the album, that’s for fucking certain.”

            “Well, as I said, it was more the thematic material of the lyrics that—”

            “Yeah, yeah, I get it.  Look, if I take the gig, I’m not going to be on film doing anything…uh…illegal, right?  I mean, sexual crimes?”

            “That depends on what you mean by ‘sexual crimes,’” Burris said.

            “I mean, I don’t want to make a movie where I’m filmed fucking a fifteen year old.”

            “I’d think you’ve filmed enough of them by now to know that sex scenes are always faked,” Burris sighed.

            “I’m not even comfortable faking that.  Not at my age.”  God knows, he fucked enough teenagers back when he was in his twenties, but that was a long time ago!

            Burris cleared his throat.  “Of course none of that’s on screen,” he said, his voice trembling ever so slightly.  So it currently _was_ on screen, but was about to be changed to off screen.  Well, fine.  As long as it was changed.  “But in the early part, before your character’s arrested, one of the crimes he commits is prostitution, so there’s still a—”

            Curt laughed.  “Yeah, I’m not gonna have a problem with pretending to sell my ass.  Or am I selling my cock?”

            “It’s not _that_ specific…but probably the ass, yes.  Roman men didn’t like to allow themselves to be penetrated.”  Too much information.  “Does all this mean you’ll take the part?”

            “Mandy will kill me if I outright agree without talking to her first, but I think I’d like to, yeah.”  Just the idea of playing someone bisexual instead of straight was such a relief!  How could he possibly refuse?  “It sounds like the script still needs a heavy rewrite, so maybe you could just send a detailed plot summary for her to look over.”

            Burris agreed enthusiastically.  Well, of course he did.  A movie like that would be nothing but a thin joke if Curt didn’t agree to be in it.

 

***

 

            _Danger Zone_ was being filmed in Spain, of all places.  For some reason, Beau explained as they were all flying out there, there were more Roman ruins standing apart from modern buildings in Spain than there were in Italy.  And enough other movies had been filmed there with a Roman setting that there were dozens of handy sets available for their use for the indoor scenes.  Plus the countryside had the look people were expecting for ancient Italy.  Personally, Curt didn’t think most of the countryside of Spain was anything like the countryside of Italy, but most of the movie-going populace probably hadn’t visited both countries.

            The longer filming went on, the more stressful it got.  The teenage boy was being played by the same boy from that comedy—even though he was no longer a teenager—and he was still giving Curt lethal bedroom eyes.  But he wasn’t as pretty as Curt’s memories of Arthur, and it seemed like every day something would happen on set to make him think of Arthur, and especially that night they spent together back in ’75.

            Curt spent most of the time between takes completely drunk off his ass, locked in his hotel room.  Though things were slightly alleviated when Trevor and the rest of the Venus in Furs stopped by the set for a visit.  It was nice having some friends and allies around.  In fact, they enjoyed the visit so much—and Beau and his boyfriend were so excited to have them there—that they stayed several days extra in order to play bit parts as barbarian warriors.

            Once they finished filming in Spain, they went up to London so Curt could re-record a couple of the songs from “Danger Zone” with slightly altered orchestrations to fit the changes popular music had gone through between 1973 and 1990, and to do the ADR work.  Recording some sexual grunts and groans to accompany the scene where the teenage girl overhears Curt’s character fucking her brother nearly ended in disaster:  hearing that beautiful boy make those kinds of noises actually gave Curt a semi, and he had to lock himself in the john to give himself a cold shower out of the sink.  Worse, everyone had seen it.  They knew he’d reacted like that to a boy in his early twenties letting out sexual moans.

            If he didn’t do something fast, everyone was going to know the truth.

            So what could he do but give in to the insistent demands of the woman playing the kid’s mother and take her on a date to one of London’s trendiest hot spots?  There were enough paparazzi on the door to ensure that every tabloid in the world would have their own unique shot of Curt walking through that door with his arm around the boring bimbo.  That’d keep them from printing any stories claiming he was fucking that boy.

            Of course, trendy hot spots had their downsides.  Specifically, the people using drugs in the bathroom, the crappy modern music, and the general lack of anything actually cool about the place.  Curt wanted to leave again within ten minutes of getting there, and the woman agreed it wasn’t a pleasant place.

            So they beat it and went to an ordinary pub instead.  That was a relief in more ways than one.  On top of the fact that they could talk without having to shout, there was no music playing at all:  there was a TV over the bar running a late night talk show instead.  That saved Curt from having to think of anything to talk about.

            After a lackluster comedy sketch, the show switched over to some uninteresting little twerp interviewing Arthur.  They started out by talking about Manchester—apparently, the twerp was also a native, though he’d managed to kick the accent that still made Arthur’s speech so mesmerizing to listen to—and Arthur saying that he hadn’t been there since November of 1973, and that he only missed the place, not the people.  “Except maybe my mum,” he added, with an adorably sheepish smile.  That smile made Curt’s chest grow tight.  It had usually preceded a lot of kissing…

            The interviewer laughed at that, and the subject changed to how and why he had moved to New York, producing a ridiculous number of evasions and lies.  Arthur still sucked at lying.  In fact, he might have been worse at it than ever.  Finally, the twerp took pity on him and asked something meaty.  “Tell me about your feud with Tommy Stone,” he said.  “How did you go from allies to enemies?”

            Arthur laughed uncomfortably.  “I don’t think ‘enemies’ is a good word for it at all.”  He bit his lip to hide a small smile.  “It could ‘ave been a lot worse, really.  There’s a lot of things he doesn’t know about me that would ‘ave _really_ made him cross.”

            “What sort of things?” the interviewer pressed.  “Did you run over his dog?”

            “Can’t imagine Tommy Stone carin’ for an animal,” Arthur chuckled.  “No, I…ah…let’s say he and I ‘ave an ex in common, only he doesn’t know that.  And I don’t think he’s over that ex any more than I am.”  Curt’s heart started pounding.  That couldn’t…that _couldn’t_ be true!

            “Ohhhhh?  Is that why you called him a ‘traitor against music’?”

            Arthur’s laugh was warm and genuine, unlike his earlier laughter.  “No, that was just me bein’ accurate.  ‘Ave you ever _heard_ what he’s passin’ off as music?”

            The twerp laughed.  “Good point,” he agreed.  “But tell me about what _did_ happen between you two.  The last I heard, he was accusing you of outright blackmail.”

            Arthur’s brow furrowed, and he looked down at his hands as they fidgeted with Brian’s pin, which he was still wearing as a tie tack.  God, he really sucked at being on camera.  “That’s…”  He sighed.  “I don’t think blackmail is the right word, but…it was unprofessional of me, I’ll admit that much.  I was desperate.  I needed a source who could provide the final pieces of the jigsaw.  None of the other sources I had found had just the information I needed.  But I knew a secret of Tommy’s, and I knew he was privy to enough of the committee’s secrets to be able to help me.  I tried to talk him into cooperatin’ for the right reasons, but he wouldn’t do it.”  Arthur shook his head.  “So I told him the truth.  Without his help, I couldn’t print my story on the Committee for Cultural Renewal.  Without his information, it wouldn’t ‘ave been much more than rumor and unfounded accusations.  I’d promised my editor a big scoop, and I was goin’ to deliver on that promise.  If Tommy wouldn’t give me the information I needed to print the story I wanted to print, the story the world needed to read, I’d ‘ave to give my editor a scoop on Tommy’s big secret instead.  That secret wasn’t anything illegal, or even immoral, so it’s not…I don’t know.  Maybe it _was_ a kind of blackmail.  But you don’t know what it was like in this country under Reynolds.  Military police with rifles out standin’ on every street of the city, censorship…the only difference between Reynolds and Big Brother was that Reynolds lacked any hint of subtlety.  I did what I had to do to bring the truth to light.  I don’t like that I had to do it the way I did, but…”  Arthur smiled weakly, and made a small noise that almost approximated a chuckle.  “That common ex…the break-up with Tommy was rough.  We’re talkin’ ten years of sufferin’ over a man who wasn’t worth it.  To be honest, I wanted to punish Tommy for makin’ the most important person in my world suffer like that.”

            The most important person in his world…?

            But wasn’t that Brian?

            Hadn’t that been the whole reason Arthur had been dating Curt in the first place, to become Brian vicariously through their sex?

            The most important person to Arthur _couldn’t_ be—

            “Curt!”  He was snapped out of it by his date shouting his name. 

            “What?!  What the fuck are you shouting for?!”  When in doubt:  get angry.

            “You’ve been sitting there spacing out for the last twenty minutes!”

            “There’s no fucking way it’s been twenty minutes,” Curt growled.  The interview with Arthur was still playing, though now they seemed to be talking about ‘football.’  Because even Arthur was not immune to the English obsession with soccer.

            “It has.  You zoned out entirely as soon as the TV switched to some boring interview program.”

            “I was watching the interview, not ‘zoning out,’” he corrected her.  At least at first he was, until Arthur decided to shoot him in the heart long distance.

            From the way she pursed her lips, the woman didn’t believe him.  Curt didn’t care one way or the other.  “Let’s just go,” she insisted.  “I’m quite ready to turn in for the night.”

            “Yeah, good idea,” Curt agreed.  If he got back to the hotel quick enough, maybe he could call the TV studio while Arthur was still there…

            But when they got to the hotel, the woman didn’t get off the elevator on her own floor.  Instead, she followed Curt all the way up to his door.  After he unlocked it, he tried to find some way of explaining that he wasn’t inviting her in that wouldn’t make it entirely clear _why_.  A woman this demanding might go around blabbing…

            He didn’t have the chance to think of anything.  She shoved the door open and walked in past him.  Presumptuous bitch!  Curt followed her inside, and scowled at her as she started helping herself to a drink out of the mini-fridge.  “Don’t you have your _own_ room to go to?”

            “If you wanted us to go to my room, why did you bring us here?” she asked, in a tone of complete innocence.

            “I didn’t want _us_ to go anywhere,” Curt said, trying not to grit his teeth in between every syllable.  “I wanted _you_ to go back to your room.  _Alone_.”

            The woman slammed her glass down on the counter so hard the glass cracked.  “Why?” she demanded.  “What’s so wrong with me?  Just what am I lacking that I can’t even compete with a goddamn television program?!”

            “You want to know what you’re lacking?”  Curt laughed.  “That should be obvious!”

            “Well, it isn’t!”

            He sat down with a smirk on his face.  He _shouldn’t_ take the opening she’d given him, but it was so fucking inviting, and after that interview…  “You don’t have a dick.”

            She stared at him for a moment or two, her lower lip trembling.  “You lying sack of shit,” she finally said, her voice a low growl.

            Curt shrugged.  “Look, it was date you or lose my willpower and self-respect by fucking a kid less than half my age.  I may be low, but I’m not gonna fuck someone that young, no matter how bad he wants me.”

            She didn’t reply.  She just picked up the glass again, threw its contents at him, and ran out of the room.  Ugh.  As he grabbed a towel out of the bathroom, he tried to figure out why actresses were so damned emotional.  The other women he’d had to fuck to cover up for himself had never taken it as hard as actresses always did.

            None of that mattered right now, though.

            He went over to the phone, and began the process of negotiating his way through one call and another to get in touch with the set where that talk show was being filmed.  By the time he got through, the show had been over for fifteen minutes.  But Arthur would hopefully still be on the set.  Live television had lengthy shut down…

            “I need to talk to the guest you just had on the show,” Curt told the person on the other end, as soon as he was sure he had gotten the right place.  “Arthur Stuart.”

            There was a long enough silence that Curt thought maybe he’d been cut off.  “I’m sorry,” the man on the other end eventually said.  “He’s not here.  Never was.”

            “What are you talking about?  Your show’s live, isn’t it?”

            “Yes, most of the time.  But that interview was filmed days ago, on a sound stage in New York.”


	6. Chapter 6

            Curt didn’t get up until almost noon, and his hangover was still killing him even then.  When he found he’d outed himself to a pushy bitch over a _recording_ , he had started drinking everything in his hotel room, until he passed out in the middle of the floor.  He was late to the day’s ADR session, but no one bothered to upbraid him for it.  They weren’t laughing at him and calling him a fag, either.

            That might have been because the woman held her tongue, but it was probably just because they were distracted by the news from New York.  Yesterday afternoon, it turned out, Tommy Stone had announced that he had just signed on to play the leading role in an upcoming “major motion picture.”  The announcement hadn’t said what the picture was, but it didn’t matter.

            Tommy Stone’s entry to Hollywood surely spelled Curt’s exit from it.  Brian Slade didn’t permit anyone to upstage him.  Especially not Curt.  So it didn’t even matter if the world found out that he wasn’t really bisexual, that he had never slept with a woman for any reason other than to hide the truth about himself.

            The day after that was the first day they started work on recording the songs.  Beau hadn’t wanted to fly the Rats in just to back Curt up, so the Venus in Furs were doing it instead.  And all they wanted to talk about was how furious they were that Brian was still getting away with this Tommy Stone act of his, and how Curt ought to expose him.

            Curt had other things on his mind, though, especially while performing the new recording of “Gimme Danger.”  As soon as he was back in New York, he’d call Arthur.  Maybe they could still make things work, somehow.  Curt had enough money in the bank now, he didn’t even _need_ his career anymore.  He could live off what he’d already earned.  _They_ could live off it.  And it wouldn’t matter what Brian did.  It wouldn’t matter what Tommy said.

            Returning to his hotel room provided Curt with something of a rude awakening.  The hotel had sent up an American paper at some point, and it was waiting for him with its headline about the American reactions to Arthur’s interview.  He’d lost his job, had his Pulitzer taken away, and was being prosecuted for extortion.  The job didn’t matter:  Curt had enough money now for fifty people.  The Pulitzer was especially irrelevant, considering Arthur had refused to accept it in the first place, saying that he didn’t deserve it.  But the criminal charges…!  There was nothing Curt could do about that.

            But the worst part of the article was the reaction to the criminal charges.  Arthur had refused to be interviewed.  But his _girlfriend_ hadn’t.  “I trust in my man,” she said.  _My_ man.  “He did the right thing, and I know history will realise the truth and take our side.”  _Our_ side.  “We’ll beat this together.”  _We_.  _Together_.  “And if the courts don’t see reason, and my poor Arthur has to serve a little time, I’ll wait for him.”  _My_ Arthur.  _I’ll_ wait for him.  “As the most important person in his life, it’s my duty to take care of him.”

_His most important person…_

            “Goddamn it!”  Why?  Why did everything always turn out like this?  “Motherfucker!”  What was wrong with him?  “Stupid fucking bitch!”  Why did no one think he was worth caring about?

            That long-suffering ex of Tommy’s that Arthur was talking about was some _woman_?

            Did he even remember Curt existed?

            Did he even care?

            Had he _ever_ cared?

            Had anyone?

 

***

 

            Curt had pretty much stayed drunk the entire rest of the time he was in London.  He’d sobered up briefly to finish up the ADR recordings, but he’d been shitfaced for the rest of the songs.  He’d usually been under _some_ kind of influence when he was singing anyway.  Beau had been a little pissed about him showing up drunk all the time, but he’d been more pissed about the bill for the damages Curt had inflicted on his hotel room.  Personally, Curt figured the hotel ought to have paid those themselves.  They were the ones who sent up that newspaper without being asked, so it was their own damn fault.

            He hadn’t quite been sober by the time the plane landed at JFK, but almost.  He was close enough to sober to be able to get home with his stuff without any help, anyway.

            The first thing Curt did on getting back into his apartment was to take that horrible, horrible newspaper out of his suitcase.  He’d brought it back with him as a reminder that his life was, always had been and always would be shit.

            As he opened the drawer to add the newspaper to it, his eye was caught by that one letter from Arthur that he _hadn’t_ ripped up.  Despite himself, Curt picked up the letter before depositing the newspaper in the drawer.

            Carefully, he opened the envelope, and slipped out the letter that had been waiting almost three years for him.  It was surprisingly short.  All it said was “I don’t know what I did to upset you, but it’s clear to me now that you really and truly hate me.  Whatever I did, I’m sorry.  I wish you’d give me a chance to make up for it, whatever it was, but I suppose you never will.  It seems like I’m only making you hate me more, so this is the last time I’ll try to contact you.  I just want you to know that I love you, and I always will.”

            “Arthur…”  Curt’s voice caught in his throat.  It was hard to breathe, and his eyes were stinging.

            If only he had opened this letter at the time…

            Maybe then…

            But it was too late now.  No matter what he had felt back in 1988, Arthur didn’t love him anymore.  He had found someone new.

            Once again, Curt had fucked up, missed his opportunity.

 

***

 

            By the time _Danger Zone_ opened, there had been developments on two of the three news stories Curt was worried about.  The third…still hadn’t appeared.  But it was surely only a matter of time.  He’d admitted to being gay, and—even worse—he’d admitted it to a woman who had been expecting him to fuck her.  There was no way she was keeping quiet about it.  Maybe she wasn’t telling the press directly, but she’d be telling all her friends, and sooner or later some gossip columnist would catch wind of it, and then everyone would know.

            But maybe it didn’t matter if they _did_ find out.  It’s not like there was anyone out there Curt cared about.  No one who didn’t already know that particular truth, anyway.

            The developments in the other stories were actually pretty positive.  Tommy Stone’s ‘major motion picture’ turned out to be a romantic comedy, in which he was—predictably enough—playing a rock star.  Curt had never made a romantic comedy, and had only made the one mainstream comedy at all.  He’d ended up mostly in dramas, black comedies and strange, quirky little pictures that defied categorization.  So if Tommy wanted to compete with Curt or crush his acting career, he was starting in the wrong place.

            Just before Arthur’s trial would have started, he was brought to the White House, where President Dukakis pardoned him for the mild extortion used against Tommy Stone, calling him “an American hero” for having stood up for the rights of the people against dictatorship.  Despite that Arthur was _English_.  There was a brief media frenzy on Arthur’s return to New York, but then he completely fell off the radar, and Curt didn’t hear anything more about him.

            The opening of _Danger Zone_ ended up taking a lot of Curt’s time and attention anyway.  The critics were practically falling on their knees to kowtow to it—though that was typical of a Beau Burris movie—and audiences were actually getting into it, too.  It wasn’t setting the box office on fire—too many scenes of Curt and that beautiful boy—but it _was_ making a profit.

            And when Oscar season came around, _Danger Zone_ was dominating the nominations.  Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay…and Curt’s first ever Best Actor nomination.  Beau was ecstatic—despite that he was routinely nominated for his screenplays and direction—but Curt couldn’t bring himself to care.  In fact, he didn’t even attend the award ceremony.  Fortunately, he didn’t win.  It would have been humiliating to win and not be there for it.

            Despite the Oscar nod, Curt’s prospective gigs were not coming in like they used to.  Either that was Tommy Stone’s presence diminishing Curt’s luster, or—perhaps more likely—it was because everyone had heard about Curt’s week and a half drinking binge and the destroyed London hotel room, and they thought he was slipping back down into his ‘70s excesses.  He could hardly have explained to them that it was because he’d found out an ex-boyfriend _wasn’t_ still crazy about him after all.  Especially considering Curt was the one who had done the dumping.  It would have made him look excessively shallow and selfish.  He probably _was_ both of those things, but…

            A few months after the Oscars, Curt finally got a new acting gig.  It was one of those new breed of ‘serious’ Westerns, or it _wanted_ to be, anyway.  Curt’s character, Earl McBride, was a tortured former gunslinger who had gone straight after serving a jail sentence.  Shane without the substance, essentially, or the willpower to actually hold off on shooting people.  Still, he was a strong character with a purpose and about half of a character arc.  It would probably have been a full arc if he didn’t get shot at the end of Act Two.  All that was well and good for a serious movie, but the hero…he was a problem.  The character had the ludicrous name of Jasper Justice, and he was so straight-laced that he made the Lone Ranger look shifty.

            But the director claimed this was an old draft of the script, and that the new draft would be better.  And this was the first offer Curt had gotten since _Danger Zone_.  And he needed _something_ to distract him from his catastrophic love life.

            So he took the gig.

            What else could he do?

            The up side of making a Western was that he didn’t have to cut his hair.  He’d been growing it out since before _Danger Zone_ , and it was back down to his shoulders by now.  They’d asked him to cut it, but then he’d pointed out that some real people in the Wild West, like Buffalo Bill, had hair down to their shoulders, so why couldn’t Earl McBride?

            The down side, of course, was that it was filming in the mountains of Colorado in the fall and the winter.  It didn’t bother Curt, but there was much complaining about the cold from the other cast members—and even the crew—as soon as they set up at the ghost town where they were filming.  It was a real ghost town, left over from the Colorado gold rush, and it was pretty fucking dilapidated, even after the studio’s workmen had spent a month repairing the exteriors a bit.  It was actually _supposed_ to be a ghost town, but it wasn’t supposed to look quite so much like a strong wind would knock it all over.

            The plan was to film all the fall exteriors, return to Denver to do the sound stage stuff, and then return to the ghost town after the first serious snowfall to film the winter exteriors.  Until they finished the fall exteriors, none of them could leave the ghost town, because they didn’t have much time to get it all shot unless they wanted to finish filming _next_ fall.

            But they still got newspapers delivered along with their food, and they had TV reception after a fashion, so Curt found out that Tommy’s romantic comedy was a bomb with both the reviewers and audiences, and that everyone agreed he was simply playing himself.  That was some relief, anyway; it looked like Brian wasn’t going to get a film career after all.

            When they did finally return to civilization, Curt got a break of almost a week, because his character didn’t have as many interior scenes as the hero did.  It was long enough that he could easily have gotten on a plane and gone back to New York for a few days, but what was the point of that?  In fact, that might have been worse; there were too many places in New York that he associated with Arthur…

            To try and alleviate his boredom, Curt was taking some time to get to know Denver, and on the second day he was in town, he found himself in a massive bookstore, being confronted by a new release table filled with books whose cover featured a photo collage of President Reynolds, Tommy Stone and Arthur.  Unsteadily, Curt picked up a copy.  The title, _The Right Reasons_ , was written in big, bold letters, completely unmissable, but he couldn’t see the name of the author until he was holding it in his hands.  Then he saw it, down at the bottom of the cover:  Arthur Stuart.

            He’d written a book about it?

            Curt wasn’t even sure if he wanted to look through the book’s pages, let alone read it.  If Arthur spent any time talking about that “common ex” he and Tommy shared…Curt didn’t want to know.  He didn’t want to know who Brian had fucked after breaking up with him and Mandy.  He didn’t want to know who was keeping Arthur’s bed warm now.

            There ought to be a law that you couldn’t move on after crushing someone’s heart into powder.  Not unless you could make sure they’d never find out about it.

            Curt returned the book to the stack, left the store, and made his way to the nearest bar.  He needed to be drunk right now.

 

***

 

            With a hangover as bad as the one he had, Curt could hear the television loud as shouting even with the volume on its lowest setting.  He had somehow fetched up on a local access station.  It seemed to be a couple of old ladies talking about a book club.  In his state, Curt wasn’t sure if it was bad local comedy about old ladies trying to have a book club, or if the old ladies actually _were_ hosting a book club, where the viewers were the other members.  It didn’t matter.  All that mattered was that he could use it as background chatter to try and force himself back into a state vaguely resembling a human being.  He didn’t have that many days left of his brief break in shooting, and if he started getting a reputation as a lush, he’d never work again.

            Not that he really had any great desire to keep on acting, but he needed something to do to keep him distracted, and acting filled that hole as well as anything else.

            After he’d been lying there not particularly listening to the boring chatter of the old ladies for about ten minutes, Curt found himself on the edge of falling asleep, and began to wonder if he _should_ just go back to sleep, or if he should try to wake up.  There probably wasn’t much point to being awake, really…

            “What should we read for next week?” one of the old ladies on the television asked the other.

            “I don’t know, Mildred.  Why don’t we ask our friends?”

            “Oh, yes, let’s!”  She clapped her hands.  “Call in now to make your suggestions, dearies!”  So it was some kind of live shit where old ladies were trying to have a book club with the audience, then.  Someone obviously had too much time on their hands.

            There was the sound of a phone ringing.  “You’re on the air, dearie,” one of the old ladies said.  “Did you have a suggestion for us?”

            “I sure did, Gramma Mildred!” a young-sounding woman’s voice replied.  “We should read _The Right Reasons_ next.”

            Curt’s heart lurched into full pound even before he sat up.

            “And why’s that, dear?”

            “Well, you know, it’s by that cute British guy who, like, totally dethroned President Reynolds, right?  About everything that happened.  So it’s, like, topical and stuff.  It totally fulfills my Social Studies book report requirements.”

            Sounded like Arthur wouldn’t have any trouble scoring with the high school girl crowd.  Not that he needed to, since he had a girlfriend…

            “Mmm, I’m not sure if that’s a good reason to read it,” the second old lady said.

            “But he’s _so cute_!” the girl on the phone whined.  “And he’s gonna be in town, like, tomorrow signing copies!  My mom totally won’t take me to see him unless I’ve got an excuse, you know?”

            Arthur was going to be here?  Tomorrow?

            “That’s still not a—”

            “And he’s _single_!  What if he likes younger girls?!  I just _gotta_ meet him!”

            Curt hopped off the bed, and headed over to see if there was any coffee for the coffee machine the hotel had provided.  He had to get sober _now_.

            After all, it might take him a while to find out when and where that signing would be.

 

***

 

            The signing was being held from noon to five in the afternoon, at a bookstore that seemed like it was barely more than a hole in the wall, well off the beaten path.  It had taken quite a while to get there from Curt’s hotel.

            A five hour book signing?  Sounded boring as shit.  Since the person doing the signing was just a reporter—no, an _ex_ -reporter—Curt figured there wouldn’t be all that many people showing up.  So his plan was to show up about three in the afternoon, when Arthur would already be cracking from the tedium of sitting there alone, waiting for _someone_ to turn up.  When he’d be at his most ~~desperate~~ honest, then Curt could ask him for the truth, ask him what he _really_ felt.  If he would ever consider…

            To Curt’s extreme surprise, the store was packed when he went inside.  Admittedly, it wasn’t a very big store, but there had to be at least sixty or seventy people, and almost all of them were waiting in line to have Arthur sign his book.

            Fuck.  He hadn’t been expecting that to happen.  Wasn’t Colorado a fairly conservative state?  Or maybe it wasn’t.  Curt never really paid much attention to things like that, actually.

            Since there was no chance of getting anywhere near Arthur any time soon, Curt stepped over to the counter, and caught the eye of the person working the register.  “How’s this signing shit work?” he asked.  “Do I have to buy the book, or is there a fee, or what?”

            “Aren’t you Curt Wild?” the young woman asked, her eyes widening.

            “No.  Just answer the question.”

            “Er, um, well, the publisher only wants him signing copies of his book, so if you don’t already have a copy, you have to buy one, yes.”

            Curt grimaced, grabbed a copy, and set it on the counter.  “Guess I’m buying a copy, then.”  Unfortunately, he had to pay by credit card, which entirely defeated the purpose of his having lied about being himself.  He had to sign a very personal autograph to the girl to keep her from squealing and calling all too much attention to him.

            So fucking annoying!  Ten years ago, no one ever recognized him when he was out incognito.  Hair in a ponytail, shirt on, no leathers, and no one had any idea who he was.  No one except Arthur.

            But now?  Seemed like everywhere he went _someone_ was bound to recognize him.  Pain in the ass.

            Once that annoying situation was dealt with, Curt went and got in line with everyone else.  He was far enough back in the line that he could watch the proceedings without any chance of Arthur seeing him.  Despite all the books to sign, he still looked fucking bored, idly fiddling with Brian’s pin on his lapel in between signings.  Sexy as hell—at some point, he’d replaced his ugly reading glasses with a nice gold wire pair that really suited him—but definitely bored.  A lot of people just plopped down their books for him to sign, then picked them up again and walked off without a word.  About a third of the people wanted to talk to him, and Arthur perked up every time one did, but the rest of them were being entirely mechanical about it.  Maybe they were being paid by the publishing company to make the event look more successful than it was?  Didn’t matter.  What was important was that there were too many people in here.  Curt couldn’t just _talk_ to him.  As that girl at the cash register proved, if people recognized him, he’d become the center of attention he didn’t want.

            But there was a good way around that…

            Curt borrowed a pen from the woman in line in front of him, and opened his copy of the book.  On the blank page opposite the cover, he wrote “Make a wish.”  _That_ ought to do the trick!

            It had been at least ten people since anyone had talked to Arthur, and he was looking like he was about to fall asleep when Curt slid his copy onto the table.  Curt couldn’t repress an anticipatory grin as Arthur opened the book.  He gasped, and looked up at Curt.

            With a wink, Curt put a finger to his lips to ask Arthur to keep it quiet.  He smiled brightly—god, that fucking sexy smile of his!—and turned his attention to the book.  Curt couldn’t see what he wrote in it before the book was closed again, and being returned to him.

            He waited until he was outside to open the book and see what Arthur had written.

            “I wish Curt Wild would come to Suite 317 of the Moonlight Inn at 10:00 tonight,” it said.

            Curt might have shouted “Yes!” just a little too loudly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hmm, I wonder if this qualifies as RPF with that bit about Arthur being pardoned by President Dukakis? :P (Of course, I don't think Dukakis would pardon Arthur in these circumstances (and especially not with that "American hero" shtick), but...that's why it's fiction, right?)


	7. Chapter 7

            By 9:50, Arthur had gone over his preparations at least ten times, but he was going over them again, because he was too nervous to do anything else.  As soon as he’d been free from the eternal tedium of that excessively long signing, he had gone straight to the first chemist’s he could find and bought condoms and lubricant.  Of course, on getting back to his hotel room, he had second thoughts.  He couldn’t be sure that was what Curt wanted.  In fact, it didn’t even make _sense_ for that to be what Curt wanted.  If he regretted their split, why hadn’t he ever come back on his own before now?  Arthur had made it abundantly clear that he was still in love.  But on the other hand, if Curt _didn’t_ want sex, then why would he have written “Make a wish” inside the book?

            In the end, Arthur had put both condoms and lubricant on the bedside table, then used the lamp and the clock to hide them so they weren’t visible from the door.  That way they wouldn’t— _shouldn’t_ —make Curt angry if he wasn’t there for sex, but they’d be available if he was.

            Arthur had taken a bath and been very thorough about getting every inch of himself very, very clean, and he must have brushed his teeth at least five times.  Afterwards, he had done everything he could to get his hair into the slightly messy style Curt preferred, but he was going over it again, just in case, as a break from pacing to and fro, if nothing else.

            He shouldn’t have picked such a late hour for the requested rendezvous, but what else could he do?  After the signing itself, the store expected him to sign all the remaining copies—thankfully, there weren’t that many—for them to sell later, and then he’d had to do a lot of annoying publicity photographs, so he really hadn’t had a minute to himself before 8:30.  And, of course, the later hour meant that there was less chance anyone would see Curt arriving.  He had his film career to think of, after all, and the last thing he needed was for anyone to realise he still preferred men.

            The knock on the door came sharply at 10:00.  Arthur had never known Curt to be so punctual before!

            He practically ran over to open the door, just in case Curt might change his mind and go away again.  Curt had let his hair down, but otherwise he was dressed just the same as he had been at the bookshop, his usual shabby ‘incognito’ look.  It was nice to see him with long hair again, but that was nothing compared to the pleasure of simply _seeing_ him again, in person.  Even though he knew Curt might not want anything even remotely romantic, Arthur couldn’t stop smiling as he shut the door behind him.

            “You look so fucking hot right now,” was the only thing Curt said before pulling Arthur into a deep, passionate kiss.

            Appropriately enough, considering Curt had become an important movie star, it was the most cinematic sexual encounter Arthur had ever had.  They awkwardly made their way over to the bed, stripping their clothes off as they went, all without a break in their intense kisses.  Once they got to the bed, they spent quite some time just kissing, rolling back and forth, first one on top, then the other.

            At one point when Curt was lying above Arthur, he released Arthur’s lips to take a breath, and then Arthur felt Curt’s hair hitting the side of his face.  He opened his eyes to see that Curt was looking over to the side at the condoms, with a big grin on his face.  “You’re always so prepared,” he commented, giving Arthur a brief kiss before he got up on his knees and went for the lubricant.

            Curt squeezed out some lubricant on his fingers, and gently inserted them, causing Arthur to let out a moan of desire. “Fuck!” Curt shouted.  “You trying to crush my fingers?”

            Arthur laughed weakly.  “Sorry.”  He hadn’t _meant_ to clench up…but it just felt so good…

            “Been a long time, huh?”

            “You know it has.”

            In response to Arthur’s words, Curt’s fingers probed deeper, making him gasp.  It probably wouldn’t have taken long for him to climax just from that, but Curt barely even lingered before he pulled them back out again and was hurriedly fitting a condom onto his enormous erection.  It seemed far larger than usual, and that was only making Arthur even more desperate to feel it inside him.

            Soon enough, Curt was changing his position, and lifting up Arthur’s arse.  He did all he could to help get into position, arching his back even before he felt the supreme satisfaction of the man he loved slipping inside him.

            The sex was frantic and wonderful.  Curt was going so fast and hard that he didn’t have any breath left over to talk, just the occasional moan of pleasure.  All Arthur could do was hold on, wrapping his legs around as best he could, and desperately trying to get a good grip with his arms.

            It felt so fantastic that he didn’t even need to lay a finger on his cock to come, and he was soon spurting all over himself and Curt both.  It wasn’t long after that before Curt was pulling out again, a look of satisfaction on his face.

            By the time Arthur had caught his breath again, Curt had already disposed of the condom and fallen asleep, one arm draped casually across Arthur’s chest and stomach.

            Smiling happily, Arthur did what little he could to slide closer before shutting his eyes and slipping into the best sleep he had had in years.

            It was still dark out when he was gently roused by the feeling of Curt’s arm drawing him closer.  Arthur rolled up onto his side so that he could kiss Curt, sweet and gentle now that the pressure had been released.

            “Did I wake you?” Curt asked.

            “It’s all right.  I don’t want to miss a minute of this.”

            Curt’s smile was sweet, but there was a sadness in his eyes, as if he was about to start crying.  “I’m so sorry, baby,” he suddenly said, pulling Arthur tightly against him.  “I…I just…I thought…I don’t even fucking know what I was thinking anymore!”  Arthur could feel one of Curt’s big, strong hands stroking his hair.  “I was a fucking moron.”

            “It’s all right,” Arthur repeated, sliding one arm up over Curt’s body.  “As long as you’re willing to be with me again, I’ll forgive anything.”  Maybe that made him pathetic, but he couldn’t help it.  He _needed_ Curt like nothing else.  It was a need as basic as air, food or water, and he had spent the last seven years slowly dying without him.

            Curt kissed him, tongue exploring deep within Arthur’s mouth, as if it was trying to mate with his tonsils.  “Has there—has there been anyone else?” he asked afterwards.  “Since me?”

            Arthur smiled weakly.  “Only a few birds.  After you…what point would there ‘ave been in another man?”

            “How many is ‘a few’?” Curt asked, almost sounding jealous.  As flattering as that was, it was also slightly annoying, considering how many of his female co-stars he had shagged, especially early in his acting career.

            Arthur did a quick mental calculation before answering.  “Almost four.”

            “Almost?”  Curt laughed.  “How do you ‘almost’ fuck someone?”

            “Pretty simple, isn’t it?  She came back to my flat, then changed her mind.”

            “Why would she do that?  Couldn’t she see what a catch you are?”

            Arthur laughed nervously.  “That was…actually, that was sort of your fault.”

            “My fault?”  That seemed to amuse him.

            “I’d been tryin’ to get somewhere with her for months.  First woman I’d thought I might actually be able to get serious about,” Arthur explained, sighing.  “Gorgeous, smart, talented, everything a man could hope for and then some.  She’d finally agreed to go on a date with me, and I…like an idiot, I took her to see a movie.”

            “One of mine?”

            “I’m not _that_ stupid,” Arthur told him, feeling more than a little insulted at the prospect of being mistaken for such a colossal fool.  “But they ran a preview for one of your films.  And I…I started crying.  When we went to my flat after, she wanted to know why I’d been cryin’ at the trailer for a comedy.”

            “What did you tell her?”

            Arthur sighed deeply.  “The truth.  If there was any chance of things really turnin’ serious, it wouldn’t be a good idea to start it with a lie, would it?”  He shook his head.  “Of course, she didn’t like learnin’ that my heart belonged to another man.  I told her I could _almost_ love a woman, too, but…”

            That just set Curt to laughing.  “Yeah, a woman’s gonna love that!”

            “I didn’t claim it was the right thing to say.”

            “Was there a right thing to say in that situation?”

            “I don’t think so.”  Arthur moved his hand off Curt’s back and used it to push a few loose hairs out of his face, so he could reach Curt’s cheekbone to place a kiss on it.  “After that humiliation, I didn’t bother anymore.  I knew there was no point in lyin’ to myself and everyone else.  You’re the only one for me.”

            Curt paused, his eyes crossing slightly and his brow furrowing.  “Which comedy was that?”

            “That first one, _Tour Bus!_ ”

            “That was back in ’89.”

            “Yes, I know.”  How could Arthur _not_ know that?  He was the one who hadn’t so much as gone on a date in two years!  It was hard to forget that.

            “Yeah, but what about that girlfriend in the article?”

            “What article?”

            “I don’t remember what paper it was in, but it was the first article I saw after you admitted that you really had blackmailed Tommy,” Curt said.  “After it said you were gonna be put on trial for it, you wouldn’t talk to them, so they talked to your girlfriend, and she said—”

            “Curt, I didn’t ‘ave a girlfriend then.  And I wasn’t refusin’ to talk to anyone.  That would ‘ave been the dumbest thing I could ‘ave done.  I practically had a publicist!  My solicitors knew the only chance I had of avoidin’ serious jail time was if there was enough public sentiment in my favour to prevent a conviction, or at least to ensure a light sentence.  Though none of us had ever expected I’d get pardoned like that.”  That hadn’t merely been shocking, but actually a bit embarrassing.

            Curt’s frown grew larger.  “But…that was…”  He shook his head.  “I’ll show it to you when we get back to New York.  It’s in the drawer with—”  He stopped suddenly, biting his lip.

            “You put it with Brian’s things?”  Arthur wasn’t sure how to take that.  Yes, Brian was the love of Curt’s life, so being in any way compared to him was greatly flattering, but he had also betrayed first his fans and then the entire world, which made the comparison feel a bit more like an insult than a compliment.

            “And…um…actually…that’s where most of your letters ended up…”

            Arthur sighed deeply.  “Oh god.  That’s why you never…”  He shut his eyes.  “Did you even _read_ any of them?”

            “Er…that last one.  About…seven, eight months ago…”

            “Bloody hell.”  All the time Arthur had spent on pouring his heart out in those letters, all the work he had put into finding just the right words to express the pain and anguish their separation was causing him, and Curt never read any of it except his terse letter of farewell?

            “I’m sorry, baby.”

            Arthur forced himself to smile as he opened his eyes to look into Curt’s worried face.  After everything he’d said a few minutes ago, he’d look like the most small-minded liar if he allowed himself to admit how angry he was about this.  “You’ll ‘ave to do something to make it up to me,” he said.  “Something big.  I spent a long time on some of those letters.”

            Curt kissed him with an overwhelming passion, rolling back up on top of him as he did so.  “I will.  I promise.”

 

***

 

            Curt couldn’t even remember the last time he’d woken up feeling _good_.  It had been that long.  As he felt Arthur stirring, he pulled him close, and leaned his head forward to nibble on his ear.  “What do you want for breakfast?” he asked, hoping the answer would be cock.

            Arthur sighed.  “I ‘ave to go film a local chat show.”

            “For breakfast?”

            Arthur pulled out of his arms and rolled over to look at Curt.  “It goes on live at 8.  I need to be there at least half an hour prior to go over everything.  And I arranged to meet the publisher’s representative for breakfast.”

            “Fucking hell.”  Curt shook his head.  “I’d never let anyone schedule me for a live broadcast first thing in the morning.”

            Arthur chuckled.  “You’ve got the clout to pick and choose.  If I don’t do as my publisher tells me, I’ll be out of luck.  I’m already permanently unemployed; I can’t risk angerin’ my only source of income.”

            “Can’t you get a new reporting job?”  No matter what he’d been thinking earlier, somehow now that they were face to face again, Curt couldn’t quite bring himself to offer to support Arthur for the rest of his life.  It’d sound weird if he did, anyway.  This was the first time they’d seen each other since 1984.  The fact that it felt more right—more natural—than it ever had in the past didn’t change that it would come off as really fucking creepy if he started talking lifetime commitment right off the bat.

            “After I admitted to usin’ such an unprincipled method to get Tommy’s information?  No one’ll let me practice journalism ever again.”  Arthur shook his head.  “I don’t know what I was thinkin’, admittin’ that.”  He sighed deeply.  “I must ‘ave been mad.”

            “It’s better to get it out there.”  Curt smiled.  “Besides, I…it was important for me to hear you say all that.  To know that Brian wasn’t the one you really wanted.”  It had also finally put a stop to the pointless charade of fucking women, but Curt didn’t want to bring any of that up just yet.

            “Brian?  Why on earth would you have thought _that_?”

            Curt cleared his throat, avoiding Arthur’s accusing stare.  “Maybe it never made much sense,” he admitted.

            Arthur sighed.  “It’s all right.  I guess.”  Ouch.  He hadn’t put a qualifier on it last night…  “Just…can you please _trust_ me from now on?  Unless you only want the occasional shag, and not—”

            “No, baby, I’ll trust you!” Curt said, rushing to get the words out.  He gave Arthur a passionate kiss to prove his sincerity.  “I can’t handle another break-up.”  All those fake relationships and one-night stands had been fucking killing him.  “What time are you free tonight?”

            Arthur’s smile crumbled.  “I’ll be on a plane to Albuquerque tonight,” he said, his voice shaking slightly.  “Only reason I won’t be leavin’ at noon is that they ‘ave me addressin’ a local university early this evening.”

            “Fuck.  Only the one night to hold me over?”

            “I’ll be back in New York in a few weeks,” Arthur said.  “You’re filmin’ your next movie, right?  When will that be done?”

            Curt shrugged.  “Allegedly, in about a month, but it could be a lot longer.  We’ll be depending on the weather, and people always fuck up so things take longer than they need to, and…hey, but maybe you can come back and join me on set after you finish your book tour!”

            Arthur smiled widely.  “That sounds fantastic,” he agreed.  Then he gave Curt a closed-mouth peck on the lips.  “But I’ll be late at this rate.  I’ve got to get up.”

            He didn’t wait for Curt to agree, either.  He pulled out of Curt’s grip, got up, and headed into the bathroom.  So much for a leisurely morning love-fest.  Still, Curt put the time to good use.  While Arthur was in the bathroom, he found a pad of paper, and wrote down his hotel and room number, and the phone number for the movie’s in-town production office.  Once Arthur came back out, Curt gave him the paper.  “After we’re back on location, you’ll have to call the production office to get in touch with me,” he explained.  “Lots of people had guests staying on location with them during the first location shoot.  I just hope you don’t mind cold weather.”

            “Manchester’s not exactly the Caribbean,” Arthur laughed, putting the paper in his wallet.  “As long as I ‘ave someone to keep me warm at night, I’d be fine even in the Arctic.”

            Curt gave him a passionate kiss, but then he had to start putting his clothes back on, even as Arthur packed up his shit to check out of the hotel.  It was depressing, having their big reunion risk turning into another one-night stand, but he knew that it wouldn’t be fair of him to ask Arthur to abandon his book tour.  Also that Arthur wouldn’t do it even if he _did_ ask.

            He grabbed some breakfast on the way back to his own hotel, and by eight o’clock, Curt was flipping through the channels, looking for Arthur’s interview.  It was already going by the time he found it.  Sounded like they were just finishing up the standard “nice of you to join us/glad to be here” introductory bullshit.  There were two hosts, a man and a woman, dressed identically, with matching hairstyles, as if they were fucking twins.  Maybe they _were_.

            “So, what are your future plans?” the man asked.  “Got another book in the works?”

            “Not at present,” Arthur said, with a slight smile.  “I’ll just be tryin’ to figure out what to do with my life.  At least I know where I’ll be, and who I’ll be sharin’ it with, so I’m in a better place than I was just a few days ago.”  Curt grinned.  It was such a warm feeling, having this secret agreement between them, something they could talk about without anyone knowing what they meant.

            “Oh, some lucky girl caught your eye?” the woman laughed.  “I’m jealous!”

            Arthur didn’t seem to know how to react to that, and turned away from her face.  He really needed to learn how to maintain eye contact even when he was uncomfortable.  It was cute, yeah, but…

            “Hope your new girlfriend’s not the sensitive type,” the man said.

            “What?”  Arthur looked at him, and even in profile the worry was clear on his face.  “What do you mean by that?”

            “Well, what with Tommy Stone deciding to stir up the old animosity between you two again.”

            Arthur let out an uncomfortable noise, not a sigh, but not really anything else, either.  “I seem to ‘ave missed something…”

            “Oh, you weren’t watching?”  The woman giggled.  “He was on the _Later Show_ last night, talking about his upcoming album, and how he’s going to start shooting on his new movie soon, but of course the subject of your book came up, too.  And he got really angry about it.  Called you a…um…what were his exact words?”  She looked at her partner or brother or whatever the guy was.

            “Bleeding fruit.”

            “Right, that,” the woman agreed with a nod.

            Arthur started laughing.  It probably sounded like mild laughter to his confused hosts—and the audience—but Curt knew he was laughing really hard.  “Oh, Tommy, you’re gettin’ careless!” he exclaimed.  “Lettin’ the mask slip after all this time!”

            “What?”

            “Think about it for a minute.  How would he come to the conclusion that I was gay?  I certainly didn’t make any passes at him—I’ve got better taste that that.”

            “Well…um…” the woman said, if that could really be counted as speaking.

            “I’ve never made any public appearances talkin’ about my love life, except that time I admitted my most precious ex had also dated Tommy ten years earlier, and spent that intervening ten years heart-broken over the end of their affair.  So the only way he could come to the conclusion that I was gay was if the only ex he had dealt ten years of hurt to was a man,” Arthur explained.

            “So you _are_ gay?” the male host asked, with an expression of disgust on his face.

            “I’m bisexual, actually,” Arthur said, shaking his head.  “But the mutual ex in question—he’s a man, yes.”  He turned to look at the camera, as if he knew Curt was watching.  “Not my ex anymore, though,” he added, with a warm smile that filled Curt with the desire to fuck him right through the TV screen.  “We’ve patched things up now.  That’ll only make Tommy all the more cross when he finds out, I don’t doubt.”

            The two hosts exchanged looks.  “Tommy Stone used to be gay?” the woman asked, her voice trembling.  “But he’s married!”

            “He’s been married before, too,” Arthur agreed.  “But no, he was never gay.  He was bisexual—probably still is, just too afraid to act on it anymore.”

            “But if he’s got an ex-wife, couldn’t he have thought _she_ was the one you—” the female host started.

            “She doesn’t like younger men,” Arthur interrupted.  “Or so I’ve been told.  I don’t much care for older women, either, so it never came up.”

            The two hosts spent most of the rest of the allotted interview time trying to somehow talk Arthur into changing his mind that Tommy had ever fucked a man.  Curt was actually pretty impressed that Arthur never mentioned that Tommy used to go by another name.  If Curt had been in his position, he’d have spilled the whole secret in the first five minutes and just moved on.

 

***

 

            Surprisingly, the weather at the ghost town hadn’t been cooperating, so they were still in Denver long after they finished shooting the indoor scenes.  In fact, the delay was looking to be so long that the screenwriters were working frantically, trying to find ways of turning as many of the exteriors to interiors as they could.  When the phone in his hotel room rang one night, Curt assumed it was someone calling to let him know the new pages were ready, and that they’d resume filming the next morning.

            “It’s so good to hear your voice, love,” was the soft, warm reply after he answered the phone.

            “Arthur!”  Curt’s heart started pounding through his whole body, especially his cock.  “You’re done with your tour?”

            “Completely.  I’m back in New York right now.”

            “How long until you can catch a plane to Denver?”

            Curt could practically _hear_ Arthur’s huge smile.  “I’ve already booked a ticket for tomorrow morning.”

            “I love you, baby.”  Somehow, they were the only words Curt could produce.

            “I love you, too.”

            Curt wanted to fuck Arthur so bad that he couldn’t resist telling him exactly how he planned on going about it as soon as they got back to his hotel room tomorrow.  They spent so long talking about it—and jerking off imagining it—that the phone call almost ended without Arthur telling Curt what plane he would be on!

            The plane couldn’t get there fast enough to suit Curt, and nothing seemed capable of holding his attention for more than a few minutes, making it feel like an eternity before he was finally waiting impatiently in the airport as the plane disgorged passengers.  When Arthur came out and approached him, suitcase in hand, it took every ounce of Curt’s strength to keep from kissing him then and there.  It would cause a riot if he did, though; more than one of the other people waiting had recognized him.  If they also recognized Arthur, that might make things get _really_ messy, so Curt made sure to hurry them out of the airport as quickly as possible.

            Besides, the sooner they were out of the airport, the sooner they could start fucking.

 

***

 

            Arthur had completely lost track of time when the telephone started ringing.  Given how many times they’d made love since he got to town, it must have been at least three days later.  Or maybe it was only two days?  They hadn’t really called room service enough times for it to be three full days.

            “Whaddaya want?!” Curt shouted into the phone as he answered it.  “Huh?  Really?”   After a moment’s pause, he got out of bed, and picked up the phone’s base, walking towards the window with it.  “No, I’ve got the curtains closed.”  Reaching the window, he pushed the heavy drapes aside, letting light flood into the darkened room.  Didn’t seem like nearly enough light for daytime, but it was too much light for night.  “Wow, look at it come down!” Curt laughed.  “You think it’ll be the right amount up in the mountains?”  He paused, nodding at whatever the person on the other end was saying.  “Yeah, no sweat.  We can be ready to go in an hour, tops, whenever you say the—yeah, I said ‘we.’  So what?”  Curt chuckled at whatever the other person said.  “She wishes!  No, don’t try to guess—he’s not part of the production.”

            Curt had soon hung up the phone and started padding back over towards the bed, leaving the curtain open and giving Arthur a good view of the ferocious snowstorm outside.  Ordinarily, Arthur might have been concerned about Curt parading around naked in front of an open window, but they were high enough that it didn’t seem likely anyone would be able to see in.  Especially through all that snow.  He had something else to worry about at the moment, anyway.  “Are they really goin’ to be all right with it?” Arthur asked, sitting up.  “They’re used to thinkin’ of you sleepin’ with women.”

            “I don’t care what they think.”

            Arthur sighed even as Curt slid back under the covers.  “You still ‘ave to work with those people, Curt.  You should care what they think.”

            “I’m not the only fag in Hollywood, Arthur.  Trust me, there’s nothing to worry about.”

            Those two sentences didn’t really seem to flow logically from each other, but he had to admit that there was certainly no point in worrying about it now.  If he wasn’t going to accompany Curt to the set outside of town, then why had he bothered flying back to Denver in the first place?  And there wasn’t much point in trying to hide it now, not when Curt had already told the person on the other end of the phone—whoever it had been—that the lover he was bringing with him was a man.  “How long do you think it’s likely to be before we ‘ave to leave?” Arthur asked, mostly to get his mind off the way Curt’s colleagues might turn on them as soon as they were out of the city.

            Curt shrugged.  “There’s not much wind out there, so that storm isn’t likely to be going anywhere anytime soon.  Could be a couple of days still.  Looks pretty powdery, though.  Won’t stick to the roads.  That’ll make it all go faster.”

            Arthur smiled, and cuddled in closer, slipping one arm around Curt’s waist.  “We’ll ‘ave to find something to keep ourselves busy, then, won’t we?”

            “Oh, don’t you worry yourself about that!” Curt laughed.  “I’ve got plenty of plans that are gonna take your breath away!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, the title of the comedy included an exclamation point. It was a suggestion on the NaNoWriMo forums (I'm so bad at titles, y'know?), as a reference to "Airplane!".


	8. Chapter 8

            The snow must have stopped sometime in the middle of the night, because by the time the phone rang, the sky was the dim overcast of clouds that had no more snow to give.  In Curt’s experience, it usually took hours before clouds got like that after a storm.

            His “Hello” must have sounded bleary, because the girl on the other end of the line giggled before saying anything.

            “We’re heading back to complete the location footage at ten o’clock, Mr. Wild.”  It was the assistant director, Jodi Chen.  Or was she the assistant to the assistant director?  Curt had never bothered getting quite that familiar with the terms for all those little jobs behind the scenes.  Easier to just remember the names of the people than what they were supposed to do exactly.  Whatever her title was, Jodi was barely out of college, and had more energy than a whole room full of fifth graders on a sugar high.  “Can you be checked out of the hotel by then?  Or do you need someone to finish packing your things and bring them up later?”

            Curt checked the clock on the bedside table.  Barely past eight.  “We should have plenty of time,” he told her.  “Meeting in the parking garage?”

            “Yes, we’ll be assembling at the vans.”

            Curt thanked her, and hung up the phone.  “We gotta get ready to check out,” he told Arthur, setting a hand on his shoulder, just in case he’d slept through the phone call.

            “Yes, I heard,” Arthur sighed.  “What are the accommodations like on location?  Will we ‘ave any privacy?”

            “They’re about typical.”  He chuckled grimly.  “Almost homey.”

            Arthur lifted his head off the pillow to give Curt a quizzical, almost suspicious look.  “What’s that supposed to mean?  You say it like it’s a threat.”

            Curt laughed.  “You’ll see!  C’mon, get up.  We have to pack.”

            Arthur nodded, and started getting out of bed.  “But what about privacy?” he repeated.

            “Well, no one’s gonna be able to see us unless we leave a window open,” Curt assured him, even as he got up himself, “but they might hear us if we get too loud.  So no more screaming.”

            “And whose idea was _that_?” Arthur countered, scowling at him in a manner that seemed so exaggerated that Curt couldn’t stop himself from laughing.

            “But your lustful little screams are so _sexy_!” he insisted between guffaws.

            Arthur sighed, and shook his head as he disappeared into the john.  He could get a little touchy sometimes, couldn’t he?  And he seemed to have less patience than he did back in ’84…

            These last few days had been a bit like getting to know Arthur all over again.  A sexual journey of exploration as Curt learned all the ways he had changed, and all the ways he was still the same.  He seemed to like all the same things in bed, except that there were hints he might have developed a slightly masochistic side.  That might be fun to delve into later on, when things were a little more stable.  Right now, there was still a little too much thin ice to take the risk.  More than once, he’d looked like he was going to start crying over some little thing or other that Curt had said, and another time he’d actually gotten really mad.  That, it turned out, was a very ugly thing.  But as long as Curt could avoid all the behavior that would set him off, that was okay.  All that mattered was finding a way to make it work this time.

            How many men could there be in this world who would be worth spending a lifetime with?  Curt had been lucky enough to meet two; he couldn’t assume there’d be a third out there somewhere for him.  And Brian was gone.  Gone and never coming back, as surely as if he’d really been dead.  So if he couldn’t hold on to Arthur, Curt might end up alone for the rest of his life, with nothing but meaningless sexual encounters and alcohol to dull the pain.

            While Arthur was finishing up in the bathroom, Curt ordered them some breakfast from room service.  By the time Curt was finished in the bathroom, Arthur had almost finished packing, and the breakfast had arrived.  At least the kitchen was fast!

            Packing didn’t take Curt much longer than it had taken Arthur—he’d learned a long time ago not to bring too much stuff with him when he went to film a movie—so they were actually sitting around the hotel room killing time for about forty-five minutes.  They spent that time mostly talking about the movie, the location, and how they’d be getting there.

            “It’s a pretty crappy old van,” Curt said.  “Almost no shocks, and the seats aren’t padded very well.  Hope your ass isn’t too sore to take it.”

            Arthur chuckled almost menacingly.  “My arse is just fine.  It’s _yours_ I’m worried about.”

            “Hey, you’re not even capable of dishing out enough to make _my_ ass sore!”

            “Oh, you think so?  I’ll have to work harder next time and prove you wrong.”

            Curt laughed at that, and the conversation moved on, as it had dozens of times already that morning.  That lengthy period of waiting for it to be time to leave was actually the longest they’d spent just talking since…well, since before they broke up back in ’84.  Just like with the sex, they had slipped back into their old routines with astonishing ease.  Surely that _proved_ that there was something truly special between them.  Maybe not “meant to be” status, but something much more than just any old pair of lovers.

            Eventually, it was time for them to go.  Checking out was a very simple process—the studio was footing the bills, after all!—and they were soon on the way down to the vans that would take them to the ghost town.  One of them was for their luggage—and already almost full with everyone else’s crap—and the other was for the cast.  Most of the crew were probably already en route.

            It was a big van, with three rows of seats—not counting the driver and shotgun seats in front—but no one had gotten in yet. They were all milling around in front of the van, talking about how they’d used their time off waiting for the weather to cooperate.  They fell silent as Curt and Arthur arrived.

            “Sorry, did we keep everyone waiting?” Curt asked, slipping his free hand around Arthur’s waist.

            “Yeah…?”  The kid who played the ghost of Jasper’s little brother was pale enough that he might have been a _real_ ghost, his eyes glued to Arthur, and a terrified expression on his face.

            “Well, let’s get moving then,” Curt chuckled, tossing his bag into the other van.

            “Um…but who’s your…friend?” the leading lady asked.  She looked disappointed.  Well, if she’d been hoping to score with Curt, she would have been disappointed even if Arthur _hadn’t_ been on that book tour that had allowed them to get back together.

            “I…I’m Arthur…”

            “He’s with me,” Curt informed everyone, giving Arthur a quick kiss so they couldn’t possibly misinterpret.  When he looked back over at the others, only Jodi was still looking at them.  Everyone else had flinched away.  Fucking typical…

            As they got in the van, Curt and Arthur found themselves forced to take the back row of seats, where no one else would have to look at them.  As if there was some contagion just in _looking_ at them?

            Contagion, though…that was something they’d have to talk about.  But in the van where everyone else could listen in was no place to do it.  They should have enough privacy when they got there, though.  Obviously, no one was going to come anywhere near them now that they knew the truth.

            No one, that was, except Jodi.

            As soon as the van had left Denver’s heavy traffic, she unbuckled her seat belt and left the shotgun seat in the front, clambering back into the rest of the van, until she got all the way to the back row.  She plopped down on into the empty space beside Arthur, and just started grinning at him, her eyes sparkling like a fucking cartoon character.

            “Wh-what?!” Arthur eventually demanded.

            “You’re Arthur Stuart, right?” she said.  “The guy who took down Reynolds.”

            “It was only one article,” Arthur replied, tugging at his collar uncomfortably, “and it was aimed at the Committee for Cultural Renewal, not Reynolds.  I’d never ‘ave had the courage to try takin’ on a head of state, even one as corrupt as Reynolds.”

            “That’s even cooler!” Jodi exclaimed, her voice turning into an ear-splitting squeal.  “You know, some of my friends in film school were already talking about making an _All the President’s Men_ -style movie about you, even before you put your book out.  They even thought you should play yourself in it.”

            “God, no!”  Arthur shuddered.  When did he get so creeped out by the idea of people staring at him?  It had been something that bothered him back in ’84, too.  Something must have happened in the years before their first and second meetings.  Yet something else Curt ought to have asked him about back then.

            “You have to promise me you’ll consider it when they contact you to buy the film rights!” Jodi insisted.

            “Hey, you can’t extract promises from him like that,” Curt said, scowling at her.  “You wanna lose your job?”

            Jodi crossed her arms and mirrored his scowl right back at him.  “You want everyone knowing you used to fuck Tommy Stone?” she countered.  Curt could hear the sharp intake of breath from everyone else in the van.  “I’m really disappointed in you for that, you know,” she added.  “I’d have credited you with better taste.”

            Curt laughed.  “It was a long time ago, before he sold out and lost his looks.”

            “Oh, he used to be attractive?”

            “I thought half the girls in America were smitten with him,” Arthur commented.

            Jodi shrugged.  “No one in _my_ circle’s ever liked him.”

            “You and your friends have good taste, then.  Did any of them like my music?” Curt asked, even though he was pretty sure he already knew the answer.

            “Not really.  But my friend’s mom has had a huge crush on you since the ‘70s.”

            Arthur started laughing so hard that Curt was tempted to smack him one.  Clearly, it was going to be a very long day’s ride…

 

***

 

            Despite that he’d been warned, Arthur still hadn’t been quite prepared when he followed everyone else out of the van and into a rather large snow drift.  He really should have taken the time to buy some snow boots while they were in Denver, instead of just staying naked in Curt’s bed the whole time.  It was hard to stay focused, at present, on his wet feet, however, as he found himself instead staring at the collection of empty husks of antique buildings that stood before him.  The stark beauty of the snow covering everything was turned eerie by the complete lack of any sign of human occupation:  no tracks through the snow, no smoke coming from the chimneys, no lights in the windows, no sound but the howling of the wind in the treetops…

            …and the actors around him grumbling under their breath about the cold, which quickly ruined the vista’s visceral impact, and made Arthur feel instead like a schoolboy on a class trip.

            “What are you complaining about?” Curt demanded of them.  “This is practically shorts weather!”

            “The rest of us weren’t raised by wolves,” the sole actress among them snapped.  Arthur hadn’t yet seen her without a bitter expression on her face.

            “Your loss!”  Curt tilted his head back and howled.

            The other actors started walking away, shaking their heads and muttering.  After they were out of earshot, Arthur leaned in close and slipped his arm around Curt.

            “You’ve never told anyone the truth?” he asked.  He knew that the articles in various movie magazines tended to repeat the myth of Curt’s feral origins, but considering they always did so in a snide manner, Arthur had rather assumed that they just didn’t want to humiliate a rising star by talking about his childhood in a trailer park.

            “Would _you_ tell anyone if it was _your_ past?”

            “I suppose not,” Arthur admitted.  “But surely…”

            “They guessed the general region of the country I come from the first time they heard me ordering a pop,” Curt added.

            Arthur laughed.  “The looks that used to get you in New York!”

            “I don’t give a shit what they think!”

            “Obviously not.”  If it had been Arthur, he’d have changed the way he spoke to fit in.  He had already done so in so many other ways; after all, he rarely asked an American where to find the lift, or the loo, or anything like that.

            “C’mon, let’s get inside before you lose a toe,” Curt said, tugging on Arthur’s arm.  Of course _Curt_ had on appropriate footgear for the snow.  But had he warned Arthur?  Though perhaps he had simply assumed Arthur had boots, and by the time he found out otherwise, it was too late.  Or, most likely, he just hadn’t thought about the entire issue.

            Arthur soon found out what Curt had meant about their lodgings being “homey.”  A miniature trailer park had been set up not far outside of the ghost town, hidden behind a row of trees so it wouldn’t accidentally end up in the film.  The trailers didn’t look at all like what Arthur had imagined Curt’s aluminium childhood home had looked like.  They also didn’t look terribly warm, or very sturdy.  Each trailer had an actor’s name painted on the door, and a few of them had other decorative elements:  one of them had a flowerbox beside the window, another had painted random scribbles across half the trailer, and Curt’s had a wolf painted on the door, just below his name.  Arthur couldn’t bring himself to ask if that had been at Curt’s request, or if it had been someone’s idea of a clever joke.

            To Arthur’s surprise, Curt didn’t have to unlock the door; he just opened it and walked right in, pulling Arthur inside after him.  It was warmer inside than outside, but not by as much as Arthur would have liked.  There was a slightly burnt smell in the air that indicated the heat had only just been turned on after a long absence.  “You didn’t leave the door locked?” Arthur asked, looking around.  There were a number of Curt’s costumes hanging in the closet just before his eyes, including several long leather dusters, and leather chaps, too.  They had to be expensive!

            “Of course we locked up when we left,” Curt chuckled, taking hold of Arthur’s chin.  “The crew came up a few hours before us to get things ready.”

            Arthur fought the urge to look away.  How stupid was he that he hadn’t realized that?  Maybe the cold was interfering with his mental processes…

            Curt leaned past him and locked the door, then started taking his boots off.  “Get your shoes off before you track snow inside,” he said.  “Cleaning up something like that is a pain in the ass; everything’ll stay wet for days if we’re not careful.”

            Of course, Arthur quickly did as he’d been told.  It was quite the relief to get out of his sopping shoes and socks.  He had to shed his trousers as well, as they were wet almost up to the knees.  Curt’s were already hanging from a hook opposite the door, and he was heading further inside the trailer.  “Hey, what about our things?” Arthur called after him.  “The bags!”  The van with their bags hadn’t left at the same time they had, as a few of the other actors hadn’t been able to get packed up in time.

            “They’ll keep them in the van until we’re ready for them,” Curt assured him.  “Now come in here.  We need to make sure the bed’s all right while there’s still time to ask for a bigger one.”

            Arthur laughed as he followed Curt through a small doorway into the trailer’s bedroom.  Curt could always come up with any excuse to have sex at even the most inappropriate of times!  But he did actually have a point:  it was a very small bed, clearly not intended for more than one person.  Given the chill in the air, that might be a good thing, though.

            “How long are you going to keep me waiting?” Curt asked.  He was already lying on that tiny bed, completely naked, and not even under the covers.  Arthur wasn’t sure if that was bravery or foolishness, but he certainly knew _he_ wouldn’t want his privates exposed to that chilly air for more than a few seconds if he could avoid it.

            All the more reason to hurry, then; having something happen to Curt’s privates would be just as bad—if not worse!—than having something happen to his own.  Arthur doffed the remainder of his clothes as quickly as he could, and joined Curt on the bed, hastily pulling the blankets up over them.  Of course, for them both to fit, Arthur had to be entirely on top of Curt.  Not a bad arrangement for Arthur, but he couldn’t see it being very pleasant for Curt.  Not as it was, anyway.

            To improve the situation, Arthur started kissing Curt, quickly moving from his lips to his chin, his throat, and all the way down to his chest.  He couldn’t resist running a finger along the firm crevices between Curt’s muscles as he was kissing and licking at one of Curt’s nipples.  “Say, ‘ave I told you yet how much I enjoy your new physique?” Arthur asked, looking up at Curt’s face.

            “Maybe.  Can’t hurt to say it again,” Curt laughed.

            “It drives me absolutely bleedin’ crazy,” Arthur assured him, before sliding his tongue along the route his finger had just traced.  “You’re even sexier now than you were sixteen years ago.”

            Curt made a quiet noise that Arthur couldn’t interpret.  He was more interested in working his way down towards Curt’s stiffening cock, anyway.  “I’m not sure I like that,” Curt said, moments before Arthur quite got there.

            “What?”  Arthur tried to look up at Curt, but his head was so far below the line of the covers that he couldn’t see anything until he made his way back up to where he had started.  “What don’t you like?”

            “The idea of being sexier at 45 than at 29.”

            Arthur laughed.  “What’s wrong with it?  You’re gettin’ better as you get older—like wine.”

            “I’m more of a beer man.  You know that.”

            “That isn’t what it means,” Arthur sighed.

            Curt laughed.  “Seriously, would you be happy if I said the same to you?”

            “Naturally I would,” Arthur replied, surprised that he had felt the need to ask.  “I don’t fancy the idea of my life peakin’ at 19.”  Even if he _did_ still view that night on the rooftop as the best of his life.

            “Well, yeah, but…”  He sighed.  “You know what, forget it.  I don’t think I can explain so it makes sense.  It was probably stupid anyway.”

            “I’ll just pick up where I left off, then?”

            “Actually…since we’re stopped anyway…”  Curt shut his eyes, pressing his lips together into a tight line.  “Do you…uh…”  He sighed deeply.  “Not really a good way to ask this, so I’m just gonna come out and say it.  Have you been tested lately?”

            Arthur could feel his cheeks flushing.  “I…uh…‘aven’t been tested at all,” he admitted.  “Didn’t seem like much point.  Not really been all that active.”  He bit his lip to forcibly deny exit to the question that was demanding to be let out.

            “We’ll get you tested as soon as we get back to New York,” Curt announced.  “I should probably be tested again, too.  I’ve usually been pretty careful about protection, but…I don’t want to take any chances with your safety.”  He looked into Arthur’s eyes, and his sombre expression slowly turned into a grin.  “But I really wanna be able to fuck you without anything in between us.”

            “I want that, too, love,” Arthur assured him, before giving him a passionate kiss.

 

***

 

            Those stupid fuckwads who brought the bags spent so long pounding on the door that Curt had to get out of bed and go tell them to piss off.  Worse still, they _wouldn’t_ piss off, and insisted on bringing the bags inside.  Even though Curt came to the door of the trailer totally fucking naked.  They weren’t even staring at his hard-on, either!  They barely even glanced at it!  Was he less impressive than he thought?

            Naturally, that didn’t leave him in the right mindset to finish fucking Arthur, and he ended up being a bit more rough than he normally would be.  Arthur didn’t seem to mind at all—in fact, he seemed to really eat it up.  That was _something_ , anyway.

            But the bed really was way the fuck too small to stay in for long, so they got up pretty soon, and went through the hassle of getting dressed again.  Since Arthur didn’t have any appropriate footgear—why the fuck had he come to Colorado in winter without any boots?—Curt told him to wait in the trailer while he went out to talk to some people.  Specifically, the…well, Curt didn’t know what his official job title was, but Curt thought of him as the camp’s quartermaster, since that was what the job really was, no matter its title.

            “Unless you need something urgently, Mr. Wild, I’d appreciate it if you could let me alone to do my job,” he said, as soon as Curt stepped into the ruined old house he’d turned into his office.  “Getting camp set back up is a time-consuming process.”

            “I _do_ need something urgently,” Curt informed him.

            “Oh?”

            “I need a bigger bed.”

            The QM laughed.  “I’ll see what I can do, but I’m not promising anything.”  He paused, then walked over to a stack of bedding.  “I might be able to provide you with enough blankets if you’d like to fold up the bed you’ve got and stretch out on the floor.”

            Curt frowned.  Not the best solution, but better than trying to fit two men into a bed that was barely big enough for one.  “Lemme have the extra blankets, then.  We’ll need ‘em tonight, even if you can get us the bigger bed by tomorrow.”

            “I’ll have them sent to you shortly.  Now, if you—”

            “I also need a good pair of boots for Arthur.  I didn’t know he didn’t have any.”

             An appalled look was the only reply at first.  Eventually, it was followed by a resigned sigh.  “The only way to fix that properly would be for your friend to go back to town and buy a pair.  Even if there was time for someone to shop around for a pair, how would we get a decent fit?  Shoe size only tells you so much.”

            Not what Curt wanted to hear.  Arthur would have to borrow a pair from someone else.  Not that any of his straight co-stars were going to want to loan him their shoes.  But maybe he could wear Curt’s.  He had all those boots from his costumes, so he didn’t really need his snow boots.  After hiking back to the trailer, Curt explained the situation, and Arthur agreed to try on Curt’s boots.  They didn’t fit him perfectly, but well enough that wearing them shouldn’t cause him any serious problems.  The idea of bunking down on the floor didn’t seem to sit too well with Arthur, but they really were delivered enough blankets to make it both comfortable and warm, so Curt didn’t see any reason to worry about it.

            Dinner was tense and uncomfortable, with the entire cast and crew trying to put a wider space between themselves and Curt and Arthur than there was actually room for.  The entire crew other than Jodi, anyway.  She was sitting at their table and giddily gabbing at them throughout the entire meal.  What most annoyed Curt about the situation was that he knew for a fact that he wasn’t the only gay man in the room.  The others were just too fucking scared of alienating everyone else by showing their solidarity.  A few of them cast the rare, furtive and very jealous glance in their direction, though.

            After dinner, there was a production meeting, talking about the schedule for the next few days, making plans in case it started snowing again, all the usual bull.  Curt had told Arthur he could go back to the trailer, but instead he stayed there with them, watching with a level of interest that Curt couldn’t understand.  The meeting was ball-crushingly boring, no matter how he looked at it, and he was actually an active part of it!

            Once that was finally over, they headed back to the trailer to go to bed.  Normally, Curt wouldn’t want to turn in so early, but a 5 AM call time was really fucking early, and how was he going to turn in a good performance if he wasn’t fully rested?  Fortunately, despite Arthur’s misgivings, the blankets made the floor into a much better bed than the bunk had been.  Maybe a bit colder, but otherwise more comfortable.

            That knock on the door came all too soon, though.  It felt like Curt had only just fallen asleep by the time some PA was banging on the door and telling him to report to make-up.  Part of him wanted desperately to tell them to fuck off, but he knew he couldn’t do that if he wanted to keep working.  And having more money coming in was always a good thing.

            As Curt was getting into costume, he realized that Arthur was also getting dressed.  “Hey, no, you stay in bed,” Curt told him.

            “But I’d like to watch you filmin’ the scene,” Arthur insisted.

            “Why would want to watch _that_?!”

            “I don’t understand.  Why wouldn’t I?”

            “Fuck, we only referred to it by the scene number, didn’t we?”  Curt sighed, shaking his head.  “This morning’s scene is the one where my character gets gunned down in the street.  I don’t want you seeing that.”  Of course, he’d see it when the movie came out, but…

            Arthur’s face turned pale.  “Oh.  I…yes, I…I don’t want to see that,” he agreed weakly.  Shit.  Even if _he_ wasn’t thinking of Brian’s staged death, now Curt was thinking about it, and about Arthur being there to see it.  Even after all this time, Brian was still haunting them both…even though he wasn’t actually dead…

            As soon as Curt was dressed, he left the trailer and headed to the cabin where they handled the make-up.  And, in this case, where craft services had also set up their breakfast.  Though Curt had more coffee than food.  Anything to make sure he’d be awake for his own death scene.

            A light, powdery snow was falling when he emerged again, in the dim, gray light just before the dawn.

            “We’re only going to be able to get one take of this,” the director told them before they went to their places.  “Once the snow’s been marred with footprints, we’ll have to wait for another snowfall to try again.  So get it right the first time.”

            “I’m more worried about your end than mine,” Curt said, shaking his head.  “The screenplay talks about the look on Earl’s face as he’s falling.  How the fuck are you gonna do a close-up without messing up the snow?”

            “We’ve got cameras set up on several of the sturdier rooftops,” the director assured him.  “We know what we’re doing.  You just worry about your own job, and let us do ours.”

            Curt shrugged.  It wasn’t like he actually _cared_.  This wasn’t exactly going to be one of his better movies.  The new draft was an improvement over the one he’d signed on with—at least they had made ‘Jasper Justice’ into an assumed name—but it was still a catalog of Western clichés, rather than a proper movie.

            At the end of the day, looking over the rushes, everyone agreed that the weather had worked in their favor:  the snowflakes falling on Earl’s face as he lay dead in the street added a level of poignancy that the scene had originally lacked.  It was probably going to be the only subtle thing about the entire fucking movie, in fact.

            For the rest of the filming, Arthur always came out to watch Curt’s scenes being shot, and both of them watched a lot of the other scenes, since Curt wasn’t actually in most of the winter scenes.  He had to stay on set, though, just in case they wanted to add a ghostly image of Earl somewhere.  Arthur actually suggested the best of those:  as Jasper was walking through the street towards the final showdown, a ghostly reflection of Earl appeared in one of the windows, just as Jasper passed the blood-stained snow where Earl had died.  Hard as fuck to film properly, but it was going to look great in the finished product.

            The best day was the one where they packed up to return to town, though.  After that, they’d have to go to L.A. for a week or so for the ADR work, and then Curt would be free of this stupid thing, except of course for promoting it and attending the premiere.  But the promotions wouldn’t start until maybe a month before it opened, so he’d have several months with nothing and no one to pay attention to but Arthur.


	9. Chapter 9

            Curt had been wrong.  There was still one person who insisted on receiving attention that should have rightfully been spent on Arthur.  While Curt was out of town, Mandy had broken up with the couple she was seeing—or maybe they broke up with each other and she couldn’t bring herself to choose between them?—so she kept coming over all the time to annoy them.  Despite that she _claimed_ she was thrilled to see them back together, she didn’t do much to let them have any time alone.

            Admittedly, some of what she wanted from Curt was actually her job:  he’d gotten several more movies offered to him while they were on location and in L.A.  Word must have gotten around that he hadn’t been turning up trashed, or wrecking any more hotel rooms.  None of the parts sounded all that interesting, though, so Curt didn’t really want to take them.  It was hard to put in words just what was wrong with most of them.  There was one that was basically a romance—all too many sex scenes with the leading lady—so he was able to reject that easily, telling Mandy to pass on the word that he didn’t want to take parts with strong heterosexual romances.  She insisted she wouldn’t say it like that, but promised to make sure the industry understood.

            When the time came, the first step in the promotion of the new movie was to go on all the late night talk shows that filmed in New York.  It was always nice not to have to travel just to try and pretend he was okay with making mindless chatter with a total fucking stranger.  One of the first of those was _The Later Show with Allen Kerry Abbott_ , a pretty shallow attempt to mimic _The Tonight Show_ , which was on another network in an immediately preceding slot.  Curt really didn’t want to go on the show, because Abbott hadn’t exactly tried to stop Tommy Stone from going on a bizarrely homophobic rant about Arthur last year.  Watching the recording of that show—like a true masochist, Mandy usually recorded all of Tommy’s TV appearances—Curt got the specific feeling that Tommy was actually _jealous_ that Curt had ever been involved with Arthur, and that had been _before_ they got back together.  Rumor had it that Tommy was regularly pitching fits on the set of his new movie—a month behind schedule by now, according to the same rumors—and generally being more of a prima donna than usual.  Curt tried to believe it was for _some_ reason other than his own love life.  That would be really fucked up.  And yet, he was having trouble avoiding that conclusion.  All topics, of course, that Curt had no intention of discussing in any interviews.

            After exchanging greetings and giving a very boring summary of what the movie was about, Curt hoped that he’d get to leave soon, or at least sing a song, since Mandy had made it very clear to the show’s production team that he expected to be the musical guest as well as just a talking head.  But Abbott had other plans.

            “You know, your leading lady’s had quite a lot to say about you,” he said, with a snide smile.  “She’s not too happy.”

            “She’s not _my_ leading lady,” Curt pointed out.  “I’m just a supporting actor, not the lead.  She’s Jasper’s love interest, not Earl’s.”

            Abbott just shrugged, clearly uninterested.  “She seems to think you were leading her on.”

            “I barely said a word to her on or off camera.  Any delusions she had of getting anywhere with me are not my fault.”

            “But you _do_ have quite the reputation for sleeping around on the set,” Abbott pointed out.  “Or you did until now.”

            “It hasn’t _always_ happened.  And it’s none of your fucking business anyway!”  Why was everyone always so goddamn preoccupied with who Curt was fucking?  Didn’t any of them have love lives of their own?

            Abbott shook his head.  “She said you suddenly turned up to the set one day with a new lover in tow, having for no reason at all decided to be gay.”

            “Look, jackass, no one _decides_ to be gay.  That’s like deciding to be black.  You don’t _decide_.  You just _are_.  All I decided was to stop fucking lying about it.”  Mandy was probably gonna kick his ass for coming clean like this, but Curt had long since gotten sick of it all.  If this meant he wasn’t gonna get offered any more acting gigs, then so be it.  He could live off what he’d already earned.  “And it shouldn’t have shocked anyone I was fucking a guy.  I was pretty famous for it back in the ‘70s.  And considering I’ve never been _serious_ with a girl, where’s the surprise?”

            Abbott eyed him warily.  “Are you saying that you’re really not even bisexual?  That you’re outright _homo_ sexual?”

            “Yeah, that’s what I’m saying.”

            “But all those women you’ve slept with…”

            “It’s called a beard.”  Curt shrugged.  “Besides, half the time I got ‘em drunk enough that they wouldn’t remember I hadn’t actually fucked ‘em.  Easier that way.”

            “What made you decide to change now?”

            “Well, that’s…”  Curt frowned, letting out a slight sigh.  “A lot of little reasons.”  Starting with the fact that he had thought everyone secretly already knew, after what had happened back in London.  “Mostly, I guess it’s because of—this relationship.”  Using Arthur’s name probably wasn’t a good idea, since he’d become famous on his own.  “We were seeing each other for most of 1984, but then I…I got stupid and paranoid, and shit happened, and by the time I realized I’d made a mistake dumping him, I thought he’d finally gotten over me and moved on.  There’s nothing like thinking you can’t go back to make you realize just how badly you fucked up.”  He smiled.  “But then it turned out that he _hadn’t_ gotten over me, and now that we’re back together, I don’t want to fuck up again.  And how am I gonna do that if I’m having to hide our relationship from the people I work with?”

            “And telling the rest of the world…?” Abbott asked, gesturing towards the audience and the cameras.

            Curt bit his lip to buy some time.  He couldn’t very well explain that he hadn’t actually meant to admit it, and that it had just sort of come dribbling out of his lips like drool.  That would just make him sound like the biggest idiot ever.  “More of the same, isn’t it?  They’ve got no right to the information, but that doesn’t change that fans seem to have a never-ending appetite for stories about who I’m fucking.  And it’s fine lying about that when it doesn’t matter.  One of my earlier movies, I was fucking the guy playing the best friend, but I let myself be seen in public with the leading lady, so everyone would think I was fucking _her_.  And that was okay, because it’s not like we were serious about each other:  he was hot, and I was horny, so we were sleeping with each other, but there was no emotional attachment.”  Curt frowned, shaking his head.  “Most straight guys my age are hitting the beginning of that ‘midlife crisis’ bullshit about now.  Dumping their wives, sleeping around with girls half their age, doing meaningless shit to make ‘em feel young again.  Mostly things they never had the guts, money or ability to do back when they _were_ young.  But for me?  There’s not much shit I didn’t do when I was young, and almost all of it was a mistake, so I don’t want to do any of it over again.  And I’ve had no shortage of meaningless sex in my life.  So the change I’ve been needing was to finally get serious about someone.”  He smiled.  “And it’s hard to imagine anyone more worth being serious about than the man I’ve got now.”

            Abbott shuddered.  “I hope he’s at least as effeminate as Brian Slade was.”

            Curt forced himself to laugh.  “It wasn’t the feminine trappings that attracted me to Brian, and that sort of thing is the last thing I’d look for in a partner now.”  He paused, then chuckled.  “My lover does look good all glammed up, but there’s no fucking way he’d ever dress that way again now.”

            “He’s someone you knew back in the ‘70s?”

            Curt shrugged.  “I fucked him once after a concert, but it didn’t mean much to me at the time.  But that’s the only time I’ve ever seen him all, as he might put it now, ‘ponced up’ like that.  By ’84 he’d gone all mainstream.  The look doesn’t suit him, but that’s just as well.  I like being the only one who knows the secret of just how fucking sexy he really is.”

            By this point, Abbott was about the color of cream-of-wheat, and quickly insisted on changing the subject.  But no matter how disgusted he was by Curt’s all-too-frank discussion of the appeals of his boyfriend, there was no way Abbott was actually upset about it.  It was clear that he was fucking thrilled.  Of course he was.  Curt just went on a national television show and admitted that he was gay.  Now every news program in the country—maybe even the world—would be buying that footage to replay it.  Abbott would probably make a mint, and Curt wouldn’t see a dime of it.

            It wasn’t just Jerry; there was always some douche out to make a profit off Curt’s love life.

            Curt wasn’t much looking forward to going home, either.  Arthur had been very noncommittal about whether he would wait around for Curt to get back from the taping—they hadn’t wanted to be seen together in that kind of setting, just in case—or if he would go back to his place and just see Curt later.  Curt wasn’t even sure which he’d prefer:  returning to an empty apartment, or returning to a ticked off Arthur who didn’t want the world let in on any aspect of their little secret.

            The lights were still on when he opened the door, so Curt knew he wasn’t alone even before he heard Arthur’s voice coming from the dining room.  “Welcome home,” he said, his voice all too level.  Arthur’s voice was _never_ that level except when he was forcing it.

            “So…uh…were you watching…?”  Curt was moving slowly as he spoke, reluctant to come into sight of Arthur before he had a good idea what his mood was.

            “I was.  I’m touched, but I’m also wonderin’ if it was a good idea.”

            Curt sighed.  “I don’t know.  I didn’t exactly intend to—what are you doing?”  On entering the dining room, Curt found the table littered with torn paper.

            “I thought I’d repair these so you could finally read them,” Arthur said, his voice growing tight as he waved one partial letter in front of his face.  “They represent a lot of work.”

            Curt grimaced, trying not to look.  Why did it even matter if he read them now?  They were back together, and hopefully they’d stay that way.  So what point was there in looking at the letters from the years they’d lost to Curt’s stupidity?

            “Is that the article you were talkin’ about back in Denver?” Arthur asked.

            Looking up again, Curt noticed a newspaper sitting on the table near the torn up letters.  Moving closer, he saw that it _was_ the paper that had been delivered to his London hotel room.  “Yeah, that’s it.  Not sure why they sent up a paper just that one day, but…”

            “Someone asked them to send it up, clearly,” Arthur said, shaking his head.

            “It was probably just sent to the wrong room.”

            “Curt, that’s not a real paper.”

            “Huh?”  Curt picked it up and looked at it.  It looked real to him.  “What’s wrong with it?”  Flipping through the pages, he saw content that looked entirely genuine.

            “’Ave you ever seen a New York paper called _The Daily Mirror_ before?”

            “I don’t really pay attention to—”

            “There isn’t one.  And that thing in your hands?  Most of the articles in it are from the _Times_.  One of them even still has the date on it, about three days before the date on the front.”

            “Really?”  Curt started looking at the inner pages more closely.  He hadn’t noticed anything like that!

            “The article about me is what _really_ should ‘ave told you it was fake.”

            “How was I supposed to know you wouldn’t have gotten a girlfriend?  Be reasonable!”

            “Curt, don’t you ever pay _attention_ to things?!  Look at the article!  Look at the _words_ in the article.”

            “The words…?”  Curt scanned it over.  “Wait…’honourless’…’colour’…what the fuck?”

            “Obviously, it was printed up in London, and clumsily at that.  There’s plenty of places that’ll print up a fake newspaper.  They must ‘ave copied out those _Times_ articles to make it seem more genuine.  Probably cost a small fortune.”

            Curt’s hands started trembling.  “That motherfucker!  He had to go and punish me just because he found out I’d fucked you?!”

            “I’d say he was probably tryin’ to punish me,” Arthur corrected.  “Makin’ sure that even if you saw that interview, you wouldn’t forgive me and take me back.”

            “Son of a bitch…”  Curt crumpled up the newspaper in his hands.  “We can’t let him think he’s won.”  Just in case those fits Tommy was pitching _weren’t_ because he’d heard Arthur telling the world he’d gotten back together with that special ex.

            Arthur looked at him, his eyebrows hitched up in curiosity.  “What are you suggestin’ we do?”

            “Let’s make sure he knows we’re back together.  Really _flaunt_ it,” Curt said, with a grin.  “When the time comes, I want you to attend the premiere with me.”  That’d be a gesture showy enough even for Brian Slade.

 

***

 

            About two weeks before the premiere, Arthur came over unexpectedly in the middle of the afternoon.  There was never a bad time for sex, as far as Curt was concerned, but he was surprised to see Arthur changing his mind about such things  Surprised, but definitely pleased.

            Arthur shirked out of his kiss almost immediately, though.  “That’s not why I’m here,” he insisted.

            “Why else would you be here?” Arthur’s new apartment was actually nice, unlike the rathole he used to live in, so it wasn’t as though he was coming over just to get out of his own place, the way he used to.

            “I told you that Jodi still hadn’t given up on the idea of makin’ a movie about me, right?”

            “I can’t do anything to stop her.  Just get an answering machine and screen your calls like everyone else.”  How Arthur could cope with not having an answering machine in this day and age—and with his somewhat infamous status!—was utterly beyond Curt.

            Arthur shook his head.  “She’s taken it to another level.  Her mates formed a production company and contacted my publisher about buyin’ the film rights to the book.”

            “Well, at least they’re determined,” Curt chuckled.  “What are you gonna do?”

            “I don’t know.”  Arthur flopped down on the sofa with a heavy sigh.  “The publisher wants me to take the deal.”

            “Of course they do.  It’s free money.”

            “It seems so _arrogant_ to sell a chunk of your own life story to Hollywood, especially such a recent chunk.”

            “Hey, _All the President’s Men_ wasn’t all that long after Watergate,” Curt pointed out.

            “That’s true.”  Arthur frowned.  “So, you want me to take it?”

            “I don’t want you to feel you _have_ to turn it down.  But you shouldn’t feel like you _have_ to accept it, either.  What do you actually _want_ to do?”

            “I just said I didn’t know, didn’t I?  Besides, you know they won’t stick to the book.  They’ll put you in there, too.”

            “Hey, we could play ourselves,” Curt laughed.

            “Believe me, Jodi and her mates have suggested that.  Repeatedly.”  From the tone of Arthur’s voice, anyone might have thought he was discussing the most brutal torture imaginable.

            Curt sat down beside him, slipping a comforting arm around his shoulders.  “I’m sorry, baby.  I wasn’t…I didn’t mean anything…I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”

            Arthur chuckled lightly, putting his own arm around Curt.  “I know.  And I wasn’t hurt.  It’s just…I really don’t know what I should do.”

            “Is there a time limit on the offer?”

            “Not that I was told about, but I believe there usually is.”

            “Well, until you’re told otherwise, just assume there _isn’t_ one, and spend as long as you want mulling it over.  It’s not the kind of decision you can take back.  You don’t want to make it wrong.”

            Arthur looked at him, a slightly bemused smile on his lips, and eyebrows raised.  “When did Curt Wild become the voice of reason?”

            “When he realized he’d turned forty-five.”  Not that he liked to think about _that_ at all.

            “Uh-oh."  Arthur chuckled.  "Is it that...what did you call it, 'midlife crisis bullshit?'  Are you going to get a red sports car and a waifish little boyfriend to make yourself feel young again?”

            “I’ve already got a waifish little boyfriend,” Curt chuckled, leaning in to kiss him.  “Sports car isn’t a bad idea, though.  Oh, or maybe a motorcycle!”

            Arthur laughed.  “I’m surprised you don’t already ‘ave a dozen motorcycles.  That was what I always pictured you driving.  Er, riding.”

            Curt laughed.  “Nah, you have to get a special motorcycle license first.  No one was gonna let someone with as many drug issues as I had even take the test, much less pass it.  I used to borrow other people’s bikes anyway, though.”

            “You know, between the two, I think I’d prefer it if you got the sports car,” Arthur commented, with a thoughtful look on his face.  “Motorcycles are so dangerous; I’d worry constantly.  And there’s no room for a passenger on a motorcycle.”

            “Sure there is,” Curt assured him, stroking his inner thigh.  “You just have to cuddle up right behind me.”

            “Works for me,” Arthur agreed, with a passionate kiss.

            One kiss led to another, and another, and soon they were fucking, right there on the couch.  Well, Curt was on the couch, and Arthur was standing, but they settled back down onto the couch when they were done.

            “I should order dinner soon,” Curt commented glancing over at the clock.

            “Can’t we go out for once?”

            “I thought we agreed not to be seen in public together until the premiere,” Curt reminded him.  “To make sure Tommy doesn’t hear rumors before he sees the proof with his own eyes.”  Though, technically, he shouldn’t be surprised in the least, between Arthur’s interview in Denver and Curt’s interview on the _Later Show_.  But Brian had always had a pretty strong capacity for self-delusion.  And word was Tommy had calmed down on the set, so he might really have told himself that it wasn’t Arthur that Curt had gotten back together with.  Or that it wasn’t actually going to last.

            “You’re assumin’ he’s actually goin’ to be there?”  Arthur looked at him with surprise.  “Why would he be there?”

            “No, he won’t be there.  But a cable company’s already signed up to do a live broadcast of all the celebrities arriving.  He’ll be watching that.”  Curt was sure of it.

            Arthur sighed deeply.  “Maybe it was a bad idea to begin with,” he said.  “I don’t like the idea of usin’ our relationship as a weapon in a squabble, no matter how vicious the other party’s been.”

            “He’s the one who started using _our_ relationship as a weapon!  Or are you saying you think someone other than Tommy is responsible for that phony newspaper?”

            Arthur shook his head.  “The only people who were in a position to know I was talkin’ about you—other than the two of us—are him, Mandy and Shannon.  It’s safe to say Mandy would never ‘ave done anything so cruel, and especially not when it was goin’ to negatively impact her own income, so that only leaves Tommy and Shannon.  It seems more like Tommy’s style, but…well, it depends who was supposed to suffer from it.  My first thought was that Tommy sent it to get back at me, but it’s possible Shannon might ‘ave sent it to get back at you.  Though that would require her to know that you were beginning to regret our break-up.”

            “So, it was Tommy.”

            “Yes, most likely,” Arthur agreed.

            “Why are we having this conversation again?”  Curt honestly couldn’t remember.

            “I don’t know.  We’re both shagged out,” Arthur said, with a laugh.  “In that case, it wouldn’t be a good idea for us to go out anyway.  Go on and call for delivery like you wanted; I didn’t think enough before I spoke.”

            “Wow, that’s a first!”

            “I’m too tired to think straight!”

            Curt laughed.  “Aw, my poor baby,” he cooed, giving Arthur a brief peck.  “That’s what happens when you do something you’re not used to.”

            “You—!” Arthur started, but Curt cut him off with a deep kiss before he could get going.  From the ardor in his kiss, he wasn’t actually angry anyway.


	10. Chapter 10

            “Thirty seconds to air!”

            The audience fell silent, and the lights on the cheery set fell to black.  They didn’t start to fade up again until the countdown began.  “We’re on in five, four, three, two…!”

            “I’ve got something extra special for you today,” the hostess announced into the camera.  “Are you ready to have all the juicy details chalked up for you?”

            As the audience applauded, the live monitors showed the altered feed that was being sent to television sets around the country, the colorful logo for _Chalk Talks with Cherry_ being drawn, chalkboard style, across the image of the set.  As the logo faded away, the cameras zoomed in on the hostess, Cherry Royal, who was today wearing the eye-injuring combination of a super-short pair of overalls with an American flag pattern over a Union Jack T-shirt.  Her signature cherries, of course, appeared on the buttons of the overalls, on her earrings, and her choker necklace.

            The audience was still being shown the “APPLAUSE” sign, so they continued to clap and cheer as men in all-covering black suits—dotted, of course, with cherries—wheeled out no fewer than six full-size chalkboards, each pre-equipped with the appropriate colors of chalk.  This would be Cherry’s most ambitious show to date, and the production crew had put in long hours trying to get everything ready for it to go off without a hitch.

            Only when the “APPLAUSE” sign was finally turned off did the audience settle down.  “We’re doing something different today, going all topical,” Cherry informed her audience, even as she walked to the first chalkboard in the row.  “I know no one’s been able to talk about anything else since the premiere of _Justice_ , but I’ve thought of something that no one else has mentioned yet!  So let’s start at the beginning!”

            Cherry picked up a bright green piece of chalk, and wrote “New York, 1990” at the top of the first chalkboard.  “Back in 1990,” she started to explain, even as she began sketching on the board, switching between three or four colors of chalk as she went, “the world was so shocked to learn that Arthur Stuart really _had_ blackmailed Tommy Stone that they didn’t pay much attention to anything else he said in that interview.  But one thing he mentioned was that he and Tommy Stone both had an ex-lover in common, separated by ten years, in which that poor ex had suffered terribly over the break-up with Tommy.”  By the time she was finished talking, her sketch was complete.  It was a portrait of Arthur Stuart sitting in a chair in a brown suit, facing the audience.  On the other side of the board, Cherry had drawn Tommy Stone’s face in a circle.  A stick figure with a question mark was drawn between them, with an arrow pointing from Tommy to the stick figure, below which was written “10 years of pain.”

            She moved to the next board, and wrote “Denver, 1991” at the top, also in green chalk, before launching into her talk as she sketched the next image.  “Over the following year, Tommy Stone went on the offensive, calling Stuart all sorts of names, eventually accusing him of being homosexual, yet he never claimed Stuart had made a pass at him.  In the late fall, Stuart was in Denver on a book signing tour, and gave an interview to a local morning talk show, where he addressed the accusations of homosexuality, and said that Tommy was ‘letting the mask slip,’ claiming that Tommy’s accusations were confessions that the ex-lover they shared was a man.  He also bragged that he had just gotten back together with that ex.  So, what you know from that is the ex must have been in Denver at the time, right?”  This time, Cherry had drawn an enraged Tommy Stone, still in a circle, and Arthur Stuart sitting before a logo of a rising sun that looked suspiciously like the logo for a popular brand of coffee.  The stick figure was drawn between them again, with a male symbol below his feet.  In rehearsals, Cherry had drawn the stick figure with a stick penis, but her producers had insisted that they would lose all their advertising if she did so on air.  As a last touch on the drawing, she put a big red heart around the stick figure and Arthur Stuart.

            For the third chalkboard, Cherry broke pattern, and didn’t put up a date.  “Weeks later, Curt Wild showed up on the set of _Justice_ with his new boyfriend.  _Justice_ , of course, was filmed in and around Denver.”  A hasty sketch of a cowboy with his arm around a dark-haired man had to suffice for that point, and Cherry was soon moving on, writing “New York, 1992” at the top of the other half of the third chalkboard.  “In the spring of this year, Curt Wild started promoting _Justice_ ’s upcoming release, and went on _The Later Show_.  Of course, Allen Kerry Abbott asked him about his boyfriend, and Curt didn’t deny it.  In fact, he went one further, and said that he wasn’t bisexual like he’d always claimed, but that he was actually completely gay.  He also said that he was very serious about his new boyfriend, because they had been dating in 1984, and he had since come to realize that their break-up was a big mistake.  Of course, Curt didn’t think anyone would be shocked to see him dating a man, because he used to be infamous for his love affair with Brian Slade, which lasted from 1972 until their bitter break-up in 1974.”  A drawing of Curt Wild’s appearance on _The Later Show_ was captioned with a crossed out female symbol.  In a circle above him was a portrait of Arthur Stuart’s face, with “1984” written below it.  Underneath the _Later Show_ image was a portrait of Brian Slade’s face, and Cherry’s rendition of the infamous photo of the stunt in which Brian Slade pretended to give Curt Wild fellatio through his guitar in the middle of a concert.  This image was captioned “1974” in bold purple chalk.

            “And you know what happened next, of course,” Cherry commented as she moved to the fourth chalkboard.  She was soon drawing the scene just as she described it:  “The marquee was lit up with the name of _Justice_ and the crowds were assembled around the red carpet, ready to cheer the arriving stars, and cameras were there to record every minute.  A big Rolls Royce limo—left over from the ‘70s, I bet—drove up, and out stepped Curt Wild in a gold leather coat and pants, followed by his boyfriend in his conservative tux.  To everyone’s surprise, who was that boyfriend but the infamous journalist Arthur Stuart?

            “Everyone’s just _loved_ to gossip about that, of course,” Cherry said, turning to the camera.  Disappointed murmurs passed between the men in the audience, as Cherry’s backside in her short shorts was the main reason they came week after week.  “It’s only been two days, but everyone keeps talking about it, and wondering just how they never knew before that Curt Wild had once dated Tommy Stone.”  She giggled.  It was a sound she had to rehearse daily to produce correctly.  It often came out as sensuous instead of innocently amused.  “But they’re missing the big picture!  Would you like me to draw it for you?” she asked.

            The audience let out a roar of approval.

            As some of the black-cherry-men came back out and took up positions beside the first four chalkboards, Cherry went to the fifth one, and began to write.  “Let’s review the facts.  Arthur and Tommy used to date the same man.”  As she wrote that fact on the board, the man nearest the first board drew a box around the stick figure.  “That man’s break-up with Tommy was terribly painful, and left him suffering for ten years.”  The man also underlined the text under the arrow pointing from Tommy to the stick figure.

            “Then Arthur got back together with that ex in Denver, and the ex turned out to be Curt Wild.”  The men beside the second and third boards quickly underlined the pertinent information.  “And Curt said that he and Arthur had dated in 1984.”  The last man underlined the numeral on the fourth board.  “So that means Curt and Tommy broke up in 1974,” Cherry finally decreed, writing the number in huge letters on her current board.  Meanwhile, the number was underlined on the previous board as well.  “And that means…”

            Cherry moved to the last board, and began to draw in huge, sweeping motions.  “I really don’t see how no one’s put these pieces together before.  I mean, you’ve had _two days_ , people!  It’s not that hard!  Just look at it!  There’s no way around the facts.  The only way all those statements can be true is if Tommy Stone _is_ Brian Slade!”

            She stepped aside to reveal the image on the final board, which her body had been hiding as she drew it, and the audience gasped.  Half the image was Brian Slade’s face, and the other half was Tommy Stone’s.  As drawn, the faces were nearly identical.

 

***

 

**Minor Cable Program Makes Stunning Accusation;**

**Tommy Stone’s Lawyers Arming Their Torpedoes**

 

**Detroit, Michigan**   This Monday, live broadcast cable program _Chalk Talks with Cherry_ promoted a theory that popular singer Tommy Stone is in fact legendary ‘70s pop star Brian Slade under an assumed name.  Though this theory was based entirely on statements made by journalist Arthur Stuart and singer/actor Curt Wild, Tommy Stone’s lawyers are preparing a massive lawsuit against _Chalk Talks with Cherry_ and its hostess if the program does not recant and produce an official apology.

            Footage of the episode has been re-broadcast all over the world, and many pundits have agreed with the assessment, though fan reactions have been decidedly mixed.  Tommy Stone has repeatedly denied the accusation.  Brian Slade cannot be reached for comment—his current whereabouts are a complete mystery, which many have seen as a sign in favor of the theory—and his ex-wife, Mandy Slade, now agent for Curt Wild’s acting career, has told the press that she doesn’t think it would be appropriate for her to comment on the subject.  Curt Wild and Arthur Stuart are both refusing to speak to the press on the matter, but one London paper was able to track down Trevor Finn, former lead guitarist for Slade’s band, who insisted that the story was true.

            The perky young hostess of _Chalk Talks with Cherry_ , Cherry Royal, a peroxide blonde of at most twenty years, has considerable talent at what is known as “lightning sketching,” and her medium of choice is chalk.  Her ‘witty’ banter is meant to be what draws in the show’s audience, though critics are quick to allege that the nearly all-male audience only watches the program because she never wears a garment that fully covers her posterior and spends much of her time with her back to the camera.

            Cherry Royal’s career didn’t begin with her television program.  Under the screen name of Royal Cherry, she made a series of locally produced pornographic movies.  In the last such film, _Sex Education_ , Cherry played an art student who drew her lecherous teacher with such rapidity that it was practically animation, moving rapidly from a standard nude to an aggressively aroused nude.  The film’s director had expected to have to use a series of still images drawn after the fact for the sequence, but Cherry’s ability rendered that unnecessary.  The producer of the film told his wife about Cherry’s skill, and she decided to rescue the girl from her husband’s unsavory profession, creating _Chalk Talks with Cherry_ as a vehicle for the young woman’s vaudevillian talent.

            A normal episode of _Chalk Talks with Cherry_ consists largely of bad jokes and an Aesop-like fable, with the occasional lecture on women’s rights, gay rights, and civil rights in general.  This pattern was shattered for Monday’s program, in which she used the first half to explain her theory, and the second half to defend it from audience members in the studio and at home.

            But what made Cherry Royal think of an affair that had started about the same time she was born?

            “Oh, my mother is a huge Curt Wild fan,” Cherry explained to our reporter.  “Always has been.  Like, from before he made it big.  She even claims she slept with him after a show once.  Way before me, though!  If it happened, it was back around 1969, while the Rats were just a local garage band.  They hadn’t even left Detroit for New York yet or anything.  If it even happened.  I’m not so sure, you know?  Especially ‘cause if she ever scored with him, then why would she have been so keen on him banging another man?”

            “Your mother was in favor of Wild’s affair with Brian Slade, then?”

            “Oh, for sure!”  Cherry pointed to the twin cherry earrings she almost always wears.  “See these?  They were my mom’s, from back in the ‘70s.  Brian Slade had this thing about cherries.  They were, like, all over his posters and stuff.  I think it was ‘cause he was going into so much virgin territory, musically, that he was always popping cherries?  I dunno, that just came to me.  Anyway, supposedly, that’s why she named me Cherry.”

            “How does she feel about Curt seeing Arthur Stuart?”

            “I’m not sure.  I mean, he’s a guy, so she’s happier about it than she was with all those rumors about Curt screwing women on the sets of his movies, but I think mom still just wants to see Curt back together with Brian.  Or she did, before she found out Brian became Tommy Stone.  Yecch.”

            “So, you don’t think there’s any chance you’re mistaken?”

            Cherry asserted that she could not be mistaken:  “Study the way they move on stage sometime.  Honestly, I’m totally surprised I never realized it before now.  Brian became Tommy.  Maxwell Demon sold his soul for conservative corporate gold.”

 

***

 

            Arthur found himself adjusting his hair for the third time.  He was, at this point, going to be significantly later than he had promised to arrive, but Curt probably wouldn’t hold it against him.  It was awkward going out now; if he was alone, someone would inevitably think that he and Curt had broken up, but if they were together, there was always some homophobic arse trying to insult or even attack them, or some jealous fan trying to talk Curt out of being gay, as if that was even possible.  What bothered him most, however, was the fact that he hadn’t really seen it coming.  It had been a year since he had publically admitted to being bisexual, and to having once dated a man who had previously dated ‘Tommy Stone.’  No one had particularly hassled him about it.  Even after he had said that he had gotten back together with the man in question, he had gotten very little in the way of negative attention.  But just one public appearance with a male film star, and suddenly the general public saw him as enemy number one!

            If it weren’t Arthur’s own life, he would probably find it humorous, even absurdist.  But he was in no mood to laugh about something that had him being harassed on a daily basis.

            When the bell sounded, Arthur rather expected it was Curt, having acted with his usual reckless impatience.  So he didn’t even bother checking before he opened the door.  It wasn’t Curt—of course not, he wasn’t technically even late yet, he reminded himself with chagrin—but instead it was Octavia.  Shite, he was in for it now…

            “Been a long time,” Octavia said, with a winning smile.  “Aren’t you going to invite me in?”

            “Actually, I was gettin’ ready to go out,” Arthur said, trying to smile back.  “Maybe some other time.”

            “Really, after it’s been so long since we saw each other, you aren’t even a little glad to see me?”

            “Given the things you had to say to me last time we spoke, no.”  She had used a great many entirely inappropriate epithets before storming out of his flat…

            “Can’t you forgive and forget even a little?”

            “Are you askin’ that of the contemptible sodomite, or the disgraced journalist?”

            Octavia smiled weakly.  “How about the best-selling author?”

            “And I suppose it’s not the _Times_ ’ most aggressive investigative journalist askin’, either.”  Did she think he was born yesterday?  What else could she even be there for other than a story?

            “Just little, innocent Octavia Rosales,” she insisted, with her sweetest smile.

            “Sell it to someone else,” Arthur replied.  “I’m not buyin’ anymore.”  He tried to shut the door, but she pulled the oldest trick in the book, shoving her foot in the way.  No point fighting it.  She’d win.  She always did.  Once upon a time, he’d actually found that attractive about her.  “All right, all right, you can come in, but you ‘ave to be quick about it!  I was already runnin’ late!”

            “Where are you in such a hurry to get to?” Octavia asked, as she followed him back into the flat.  “Meeting your boyfriend?”

            “Yes.  And he’s not really known for his patience.”  Arthur shut the door, then turned to look at her.  “So, what is it you want, exactly?”

            Octavia smiled, predatory.  “The truth.  Was that little porn princess right?  Is Tommy Stone really Brian Slade?  If you’re screwing his ex-boyfriend, you _must_ know.”

            “Really?  _That_ ’s the only thing you can think of to ask about?”  Arthur shook his head.  “You’re slippin’ if you think that’s the biggest story here.

            “Come on, Arthur, don’t be coy with me!  That was what you were blackmailing him with, right?  The fact that he changed his name from Brian Slade to Tommy Stone.  I checked the official files, you know.  Slade’s name change went through in early ’79, and the name Tommy Stone doesn’t appear in any records until later that year.  And it’s not such a leap going from Thomas Brian Stoningham Slade to Tommy Stone.”

            “What, exactly, do you want from me?”  If she’d already seen _that_ , what more proof did she need?  The only other clue Arthur had had to figure it out was Shannon, and Octavia was never into glam, so Shannon’s presence at Tommy’s side would be meaningless to her.

            “Confirmation, of course.  And details.”  Octavia tapped one manicured nail on a nearby countertop.  “What made him do it?  Why the cover-up?  Why was he so ashamed of his past that he was willing to betray a group that had played such a role in his rise to stardom?”

            “Do you even know _anything_ about Brian Slade?  A conservative icon wouldn’t want to be known to have any association with a man like Brian.”

            “Just ‘cause he used to fuck a guy?  Everyone makes mistakes.”

            Arthur grimaced.  “I’m quite certain the only thing Brian looks at as a mistake about his relationship with Curt was allowin’ it to end.”  That, of course, was the reason for Tommy’s incessant hostility towards Arthur since he found out about Arthur’s relationship with Curt.

            “But Tommy Stone and Curt Wild _hate_ each other,” Octavia pointed out.  “They have ever since Stone’s debut album made the charts.  Does that mean you’re saying the story _isn’t_ true?”

            “It means, I’m already late for my date, and you’re makin’ me even more late, so bugger off!”  While Arthur’s frustration and irritation were certainly real, they also made a handy smokescreen to avoid the question entirely.

            “Really!  Such language!  And with your poor, sweet ex-girlfriend…” Octavia cooed.

            “I don’t think one date is enough for you to count as an ex-girlfriend.”

            “And whose fault is it that there was only one?”

            “Yours!  You’re the one who stormed out of here in a fit of rage when you learned I was bisexual!”

            “You were fucking _crying_ during a preview for a goddamned lousy _comedy_!  And then you get back and say you’re desperately in love with one of the _men_ in the movie?  Of _course_ I was pissed off!  You _could_ have called me later and apologised, tried to make it up to me.”

            “I didn’t do anything wrong,” Arthur said, fighting not to grit his teeth.  “It isn’t my fault that you can’t handle a man with a past.  Now get out of my flat so I can go meet the man I love.”

            Octavia pursed her lips up into a stubborn little pucker.    “I’m not going anywhere without an official statement.”

            “You know bloody well I can’t give you one.  _If_ the story is true, and _if_ it’s the secret I was privy to that Tommy was so desperate to keep quiet, then I’m bound by my promise not to spread the story, aren’t I?  I only have one shred of honour and professionalism left, and I’m not about to do anything to rid myself of it, not for you or anyone else.”  Arthur bit his lip a moment.  Octavia wasn’t going to give up unless he threw her some kind of bone…  “You need to approach the story from a different angle.  Tommy used to be under the umbrella of Reynolds and the Committee for Cultural Renewal when they were at their most powerful.  All possible clues to any and all potentially damaging secrets in his past were painstakingly covered up back in the early ‘80s.  You’re better off lookin’ for motives and reasons.  _If_ the story is true, for example, then why did no one ever say anything to expose him?  Curt, Mandy, the Venus in Furs…there are a lot of people who would know Brian no matter what charade he was hidin’ behind.  Ask yourself why they’d ‘ave kept quiet if you want to figure things out.”

            Octavia sighed, shaking her head.  “That’d feel like better advice if it wasn’t nearly word for word what Mandy Slade told reporters last night.”

            Arthur felt himself flush.  “Did she?”  He hadn’t watched or read any news in the past few days.  His own name was coming up often enough to make him uncomfortable…

            “But all right, I’ll look at a different angle, one only you can answer.”

            “Oh?”  Despite himself, Arthur was curious as to what she’d come up with.  Octavia’s ability to think around a problem had been one of the things about her he had found most sexy, even though it had been damaging to his own career, considering they had been working for rival papers.

            “When you first learned that Tommy was calling you a homosexual, you said he was exposing his own bisexual past in having come to that conclusion.  The logic you presented to explain that, however, was deeply flawed.  No one—and particularly not a major rock star—is going to know for certain how each ex reacted to being dumped, and how long they did or did not spend suffering over the break-up.  So what made Tommy so certain that you’d gotten together with his one male ex, and not one of his female ones?”

            “First things first, he’s got more than one male ex,” Arthur said.  Though he couldn’t provide access to the only other one he knew about for certain, as he had recently learned that poor Cecil had finally succumbed to AIDS.  Mandy had said she’d been almost the only person at the funeral.  “But you’re right, there are probably any number of other exes who had suffered just as long, if not longer, over his leaving them.”  Mandy was still suffering, in many ways.  “Honestly, the only reason I even mentioned that was because I realised late in the proceeding that I’d forgotten to remove the—ah—a particular item I was wearing.  Curt gave it to me back in ’84, and he got it from—”  If he said Curt got the pin from ‘Tommy,’ would that be throwing away his last shred of dignity?  It wouldn’t be that hard for Octavia to track down photos of Brian wearing the pin, and considering her eyes were already playing across it, she obviously knew that was what Arthur was talking about.  “—it doesn’t matter where he got it from.  Thing is, Tommy will ‘ave noticed it, and if I didn’t…I was afraid if I didn’t say anything, he’d think I stole it from Curt, instead of it bein’ a gift.”  After all, Brian himself had stolen it from Jack Fairy…

            Octavia raised an eyebrow.  “That’s a lot of fuss to kick up over a single piece of costume jewellery.”  She laid one finger on the pin’s green crystal.  “Could I borrow it to research it a little?”

            Arthur’s first inclination was to agree.  Maybe, like Curt, he had had the pin too long.  But he couldn’t just let go if it; it was the first thing Curt had given him.  And…something felt a bit wrong about letting a woman have it.  “I think Curt might take offense if I showed up without it.”  It felt like a weak excuse at best.

            Octavia wasn’t fazed:  she took a camera out of her voluminous bag, and snapped a few close photos of the pin.  “That’ll probably do.”

            Though she pestered him with a few more questions, Octavia was soon gone, and Arthur didn’t linger, either, hurrying out to the street.  At this point, the only hope he had of getting there anywhere near on time was to take a taxi instead of waiting for the subway.  He still ended up being late, but Curt didn’t seem upset with him, and listened to his explanation without comment.

            “Our reservations aren’t for another hour,” Curt assured him, with a gentle kiss.  “C’mon, I want your advice on something.”  Curt led Arthur into the dining room, where two screenplays were laid out on the table.  “I’ve got two offers I can’t decide between.  There’s a fantasy piece—sort of a Tolkien-wannabe—that’s going to be shooting in China and New Zealand, and there’s a period piece about Lord Byron that’s going to film on location in southern France, Switzerland and Greece.”

            Arthur stared at the scripts, trying not to look as betrayed as he felt.  Whichever role Curt took, he’d be gone from New York for at least six months, if not longer.  When things seemed to be going so well for them, now they were going to be parted for long enough for Curt to forget about him, and he was being asked to choose the poison that would kill him?  “I…how could I say without readin’ the scripts…?”

            Curt chuckled, and stepped up close behind Arthur, wrapping his arms around him.  “They’re both about the same in quality.  That’s not what I wanted to know.”

            “What, then?”

            “Which would you rather go to?  China or Greece?”

            His lips spreading into a silly grin against his will, Arthur turned around in Curt’s embrace.  “You mean… you want me to come with you?”

            “Hey, I’m not gonna get any if you stay here, now am I?”  Curt gave him a light kiss.  “Besides, you don’t have a job to worry about anymore, right?”

            Arthur nodded.  “That’s true…”  But he had hoped to find a new one, somehow.  “I…I don’t know if I can afford to pay my rent for so many months when I wouldn’t even be there to—”

            “We’ll do something about that.  Don’t worry.”

            As Curt kissed him more deeply, Arthur wondered if he was offering to pay Arthur’s rent for him, or if that was a subtle invitation to move into Curt’s flat with him.  Hopefully it was the latter.  Arthur already spent most of his nights in Curt’s flat, but the few he spent in his own were terribly painful; he didn’t ever want to wake up alone again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been wanting to use the line "Maxwell Demon sold his soul for corporate gold" since the first fic I wrote in this fandom. But until this scene came up, I never found a place it quite fit.


	11. Chapter 11

            Curt should have known better than to start a make-out session so soon before they were supposed to meet with someone, but it was so hard to resist Arthur when he was smiling like that!  Besides, he’d been sure Mandy would understand.

            She didn’t.  In fact, when she found out what they’d been doing to make them so late, she almost slapped him.  And then she subjected them both to a ten minute lecture on when it was appropriate to get it on and when it wasn’t.  As if she could ever understand what it was like for a man to repress that need!

            Of course, poor Arthur was foolish enough to keep nodding and apologizing as if they’d actually done something wrong.  Even if this had been a social visit, Mandy would have been overstepping her bounds:  they were only twenty minutes late.  And since it was a _professional_ meeting, Mandy was probably gonna charge him for it anyway, so where did she get off lecturing them about it?  She’d get paid for all the time she spent, whether Curt was there or not, so what was she complaining about?

            Once Mandy’s bruised ego was satisfied—or whatever was going on there—they finally went into the restaurant, and Curt went over to the staffer seating people, expecting he was going to have to do some serious negotiating to still get their table despite how late they were.  “Wild, party of three,” he said, trying to sound casual and unconcerned.

            The man checked his list, then nodded.  “Yes, your table is ready.  This way,” he said, as he started to walk into the restaurant.  “The other party has been waiting for you for some time,” the staffer added, as he started leading them up a set of stairs.

            “Wait, what the fuck are you talking about?  All three of us are right here!”

            The other man stopped, and looked back at Curt with a smirk.  “Yes, but the fourth member of your party is already here.”

            “There is no fourth member of our party,” Mandy told him.  “There must be some mistake.  Maybe someone else named Wild made reservations.  Ours _were_ for twenty minutes ago.”

            “There is no mistake, madam.  Just follow me.”

            “Where are we goin’?” Arthur asked.  “The seating’s that way.”

            “The private rooms are up these stairs.”

            “I didn’t request a private room.”  Curt hadn’t even known this place _had_ private rooms.  He wouldn’t really trust himself in one, anyway.  Too much chance he’d start fucking Arthur in between courses.  That might get embarrassing.  Or get them arrested.

            “Yes, it was the other gentleman who requested the private room.”

            Curt cast a glance at Arthur as they started climbing the stairs again, but Arthur shook his head, looking perplexed.  So, whoever was waiting for them was a man.  Curt could imagine a lot of possibilities, but given everything, there really was only one logical suspect.  That was why he wasn’t surprised when they entered the small private dining room and saw Tommy Stone sitting at the table with a glass of white wine.  Brian had never really cared for white wine before.  Must have been afraid of staining that ghastly suit of his.

            No one spoke until the staffer had closed the door on his way out.

            “Brian, just what are you playing at?!” Mandy demanded, moving over to the table and gesturing with one hand.

            “I’m not playing.”  It was so fucking creepy hearing Brian’s real voice coming out of his ugly new face.  “We have important matters to discuss.”  His eyes flicked over to Arthur, and a sneer twisted his already twisted face.  “Though I’d prefer it if _he_ wasn’t here.”

            “Arthur’s not going anywhere,” Curt insisted, tugging Arthur close against his side.  “Anything you have to say, you’re just gonna hafta say in front of him.”

            Tommy sighed.  “There’s no need for melodrama.  We’re all getting a little old for it.  I just want to talk.  And please sit down.  This is hardly civilized.”

            “When the fuck did you decide you cared about being ‘civilized’?” Curt demanded, even as the others started to sit down.

            Tommy laughed.  “Did I ever appear anything other than civilized?  There’s little less civilized than an aesthete.”

            Curt grimaced as he sat down.  Much as he’d have liked to argue, he couldn’t.  _He_ was the one who’d never given a shit about civilization and all its rules, not Brian.

            “Why did you come here like this?” Mandy asked.  “Are you finally ready to come clean?”

            “Quite the opposite.  I’m begging you to put an end to this.  My career was already suffering _without_ the gossip.”  Tommy reached over and took Mandy’s hand, causing a disquieting inrush of air.  “If you—both of you—will tell the press that woman was wrong, then they’ll believe it.  They’ll finally let it drop.”

            Mandy pulled her hand back.  “I didn’t tell them the truth.  You can’t ask me to lie as well.  It’s cruel.”

            “You don’t think it’s cruel to let me suffer like this?”

            “You made the bed, you lie on it,” Curt snapped.  “Don’t go blaming Mandy for your mistakes.”

            “I’m not blaming her for anything.  I’m asking both of you to help me mend the situation.”  Tommy sighed, taking a sip of his wine.  “Bad enough that Trevor already betrayed me.”  He chuckled weakly.  “Though I suppose he would accuse me of betraying him first.”

            “No need to ‘suppose’ it,” Curt told him.  “That’s exactly what he’s said every time we’ve talked to him for the last ten years.  That you betrayed the band, and everyone else—everyone except Shannon.”

            “And do _you_ feel that I’ve betrayed you?”  Tommy looked right into Curt’s eyes as he spoke.

            They were still Brian’s eyes.  Curt had to look away.  “I don’t know who got betrayed first anymore,” he muttered.

            “ _I_ know who got betrayed first,” Mandy said, “and they never did anything wrong.”

            “They?”  Tommy actually sounded like he didn’t know what she meant.

            “Your fans.”

            Tommy sighed.  “I tried to let them down easy.”

            “How is thinkin’ you’d been _murdered_ lettin’ them down easy!?” Arthur demanded, suddenly breaking his silence.  “Do you ‘ave any idea what it felt like, bein’ in the audience and seein’ that?!  The excitement of finally gettin’ to see a live performance shattered by seein’ your idol gunned down in cold blood?!”

            Tommy looked at him with one raised eyebrow, then shook his head.  “How could I?  There’s only one performer I’ve ever truly admired—” his eyes strayed briefly in Curt’s direction, or at least Curt thought maybe they did, “—but nothing so awful has ever happened to him.  And I’d hardly be present for it even if it were to happen now.”  His expression hardened.  “Is that why you decided to expose me, despite giving your word?”

            “What are you talkin’ about?  I didn’t expose you.”

            “Every one of those little comments was calculated to lead the public on merry little chase to uncover my secrets,” Tommy snarled, his usual composure starting to disintegrate.  “Particularly telling the public you had gotten back together with our common ex, knowing as you did that you’d be making such an overstated appearance at his premiere.”

            “No one who used to wear platform boots and pastel suits with glitter make-up can call anyone else’s appearance overstated,” Curt laughed.

            “It was a statement!”

            “So was attending the premiere together,” Curt replied, grinning.  “And that had nothing to do with the public.”

            “What _did_ it have to do with, then?” Tommy asked, his eyes narrowing suspiciously.

            Curt scratched his head, trying to look like a dumb ape who couldn’t remember what he was talking about.  “Now, why was that again?”

            “Curt…”  Arthur’s whisper was a warning, but Curt wasn’t about to stop.

            “Let’s see…it _couldn’t_ have been anything to do with getting some payback for that phony newspaper you had sent to my hotel room in London…”

            “You filthy, sodding bastard!”  Tommy got to his feet and flung his glass of wine at Curt’s face.  “What makes you think that was _me_?!”

            Curt just laughed.  When did Brian get so easy to rile?

            “That’s not what was going on,” Mandy insisted, trying to tug Tommy back down into his seat.  “They wanted to make a public appearance to head off any gossip rags getting hold of the story they were together and trying to make a scandal of it.  That’s all it was.”  Her excuse actually gave Curt a bit of a start.  He’d forgotten they’d fed her that silly lie to get her to sign off on it.

            Tommy was still seething, but he let Mandy pull him back down into his seat.  He’d evidently gotten used to taking orders from a woman in the last seventeen years.  Of course, with Shannon hovering behind him 24/7, that was hardly surprising, except that Brian never used to be willing to accept orders from _anyone_.

            They remained in a tense, uncomfortable silence until a knock on the door heralded the arrival of several waiters.  “Your hors d’oeuvres, gentlemen,” one of them said, making Mandy purse her lips in disgust.

            “We didn’t order yet,” Curt pointed out.

            “I had plenty of time to order while I was waiting for you to arrive,” Tommy told him.  “I know well enough what you both like.”  He shook his head.  “I could only guess what your little _friend_ likes.”

            “Oh, that’s easy,” Curt laughed.  “Cock.”

            “Curt!  Don’t say things like that!”

            Curt couldn’t stop laughing.  “C’mon, it’s not like there’s anyone in the room who hasn’t had it.”  Except, perhaps, the horrified waiters.  But who cared about them?  They were leaving as fast as they could anyway.

            With astonishing speed, Mandy got to her feet and slapped Curt.  Really fucking hard.

            “I didn’t mean _mine_!” Curt snarled at her, rubbing his jaw.  “You can’t claim you’ve never given anyone a blowjob.  I’ve _seen_ you do it!”  He’d seen her suck off four or five guys in a row at one of Brian’s freaky orgies.  Though he’d only been paying attention because one of those guys _was_ Brian.  Who Mandy did other than her husband had never been of any interest to Curt.  Back then, _nothing_ was of any interest to Curt other than Brian…  “How _could_ I have meant mine, anyway?  You think I’ve ever sucked my _own_ dick?”

            “I wouldn’t put it past you to try,” Mandy chuckled.

            “I seem to recall you trying very hard to do just that,” Tommy added.  “Where was that?  Somewhere in France, I think…”

            Curt sighed.  “I was really fucking drunk.  That doesn’t count.”

            “I didn’t know there were rules to such things,” Tommy commented, casually spearing a steamed mussel with his fork.

            “Just forget it.”  There was no point in getting into a fight about something so stupid.  Especially not with Mandy backing him up.  There was no beating either one of them individually, so how much chance would Curt—or anyone else—stand against the pair of them?  Instead, he turned his attention to his own plate.  Fried calamari, and an ice cold beer.  Not bad, but the beer felt like an insult; Curt usually didn’t order beer at a place this posh.  He’d always felt doing that would be like hanging a sign saying “white trash” on the back of his chair.  Of course, that was probably _why_ Tommy had ordered him a beer in the first place.

            As Curt sampled his appetizer, he checked out what Tommy had ordered for the others. It wasn’t surprising that he’d remember Mandy’s favorite foods, so she had an elaborate salad and some kind of sugary-smelling cocktail.  Tommy hadn’t been kidding that he’d had to guess at what Arthur would want:  he’d ordered him a sampler platter.  How much more generic could he have gotten?  Hadn’t ordered him a drink at all, either.  Probably couldn’t find one that was appropriately offensive.  Or maybe he’d asked them to send out for non-alcoholic beer, and it just hadn’t arrived yet.

            With every drink from his glass—and every sight of Mandy or Tommy sipping their own beverages—Curt found himself more and more annoyed by the slight.  But if he called attention to it, Mandy would start bitching at him.  She was practically swooning to see Tommy acting so much like he was Brian again.  Fine.  Even if he hadn’t learned anything else in all the years since they broke up, he had at least learned a little subtlety.

            “You know,” Curt said, turning to look at Arthur, “I think I’ve decided which of those two parts I want to take.”

            “Oh?  Which one?”

            “The one about Lord Byron.  Because—”

            Curt was interrupted by the sound of Tommy’s mocking laughter.  “You?  Playing Lord Byron?”

            “Fuck no, who’d be stupid enough to ask me to play Byron?”  Curt shook his head.  “On top of everything else, I’m already older than he ever got.  No, I’ve been offered the romantic lead of the picture; the faithful servant he’s secretly having it on with.”

            Tommy’s face twisted up slightly, but he nodded.

            “Why did you want to take that one?” Arthur asked, his voice shaking slightly.

            Curt chuckled.  “I want to see you sunbathing nude on a Mediterranean beach, of course.”

            As if he’d already been lying out on the beach too long, Arthur’s entire face turned red in blotches, making him look irresistibly unchanged from the way he was when they first met.  “Nude…?” he repeated, in a quivering voice.

            “Yeah, they do that all the time there,” Curt assured him.  “Of course, we’ll have to be careful to get both sides of your cock evenly tanned.”

            “Who the hell wants a tanned todger?!” Arthur exclaimed, even as Mandy burst out laughing.

            “Maybe he’s hoping it will prevent shrinkages,” Tommy suggested, in a vicious tone of voice.

            “Oh?  Did _you_ agree to that sort of request, then?” Arthur asked, glaring at Tommy.  How had Curt ever imagined that Arthur still had a torch for Brian?  It seemed almost inconceivable now…

            Mandy laughed, and put a hand on Tommy’s arm.  “Oh, Brian burns terribly easily.  If he spends too long in the sun, he’ll be all burns and blisters the next day.  That’s why he won’t go to the beach except on a cloudy day.”

            There were exceptions to that…

            “Mandy, that’s why sunblock was invented.”

            “Oh, yes, you’re really going to smear some greasy substance all over your skin.  I know you better than that, Brian.”

            Tommy frowned, but didn’t argue.  Surprisingly, he wasn’t even telling her to call him ‘Tommy.’  He must have been _really_ desperate to get her on his side…

            …but having them allied might make things get ugly later on.  Tommy wasn’t going to give up on his reason for being there so easily.  “Say, where is ‘Mrs. Stone’?” Curt asked.  “Not feeling well?”

            Tommy glared at him.  “You know perfectly well Shannon detests you.”

            “Really?”  Curt had never noticed that.

            “You didn’t know that?”  Arthur sounded shocked…despite that _he_ had no reason to know it at all!

            “She was always…”  Mandy sighed, shaking her head.  “It doesn’t surprise me she wouldn’t want to be here.”  Slowly, her face settled into its usual weary mask of the too-often betrayed.  Curt didn’t like having to hurt her like that, but what else could he do?  If she took Tommy’s side, things were definitely going to get ugly.

            They ate in silence for a moment or two, then Tommy turned a cruel grin in Arthur’s direction.  “You know, speaking of Shannon, she’s of the opinion that your presidential pardon doesn’t completely protect you from the law.”

            “Excuse me?”

            Tommy chuckled.  “A civil suit can be pressed for a criminal act.  Shannon’s been trying to convince me to sue.”  He shook his head.  “However, seeing as the public seems to be misguided enough to see you as some sort of hero, I have—so far—been arguing that such a suit would only damage my career further.  Since the court battle might end up confirming the truth we have been trying to hide, Shannon hasn’t been pressing the matter.  But if the public decides that it really is the truth, however, then there’s no reason to hold off on the suit.”

            “Motherfucking son of a—” Curt started, but Arthur silenced him with a hand on his arm and a gentle shake of his head.

            “You’re both right,” Arthur told Tommy.  “You’ve got every legal right to sue me, but it would make you look petty and vindictive, and that could permanently damage your career.”  He smiled with a warmth that surprised Curt, considering he was responding to a malicious threat.  “Should you ever decide to pursue that lawsuit, just remember that the misguided public are the ones who’ll settle on the outcome of the case.  I don’t think you’ll find many who’d side with a singer who’s twice betrayed his fans over the hero who took down Reynolds’ tyranny.”

            Tommy grimaced, and cast a long glance at Curt before looking at Arthur.  “They may not think you so heroic now that they know you’re homosexual.”

            Arthur shrugged.  “I’m willin’ to take that risk if you are.”

            This was starting to get completely out of hand.  “What I don’t get,” Curt interrupted, “is why there’s still any doubt in anyone’s mind about your double identity,” he said.

            “We’d rather left that point, Curt,” Tommy replied, in the flat tone of disgust that Brian only used when he was too pissed off even to shout.  That brought back some very painful memories.  “Changing the subject is not going to protect your little friend here from reality.”

            “I’m serious.  I all but spelled it out years ago!”

            “What?”  Mandy looked astonished.  “What are you talking about?”

            “On _True Talk_.  Back in, what was that, ’86?”

            “What are you talkin’ about?” Arthur asked.  “There wasn’t anything about him in that interview.”

            Curt couldn’t believe that Arthur, of all people, could have missed something so obvious.  “C’mon, when he asked me if Brian was still performing, and I said—”

            “He didn’t ask that,” Mandy claimed.

            “What are you talking about?  Of course he did!”

            Arthur shook his head.  “Not as broadcast.  You said that Brian had changed, and that was why he broke things off with you and Mandy, and then Baker asked if you had any thoughts about how Brian would react to seeing how much _you_ had changed in the intervening years.  And then the conversation went off on the topic of drugs and smoking…”

            Curt frowned.  “That’s not…that’s not what he said or when he said it.”  He turned an accusing glare in Tommy’s direction.  “Did your motherfuckers censor my interview?”

            “They weren’t working for _me_ ,” Tommy said, with a mocking chuckle.  “I haven’t a clue in the world if they interfered with the interview footage.  If you were dropping hints without explaining them, it’s very possible that Baker or his program’s director chose to edit it out to avoid confusion or controversy.”  He shrugged.  “I can certainly assure you that you were naïve to think such hints would have made it past the committee, however.  They would never have allowed something like that to see air.”

            “Well, fuck.”  Curt shook his head.  “I wonder why they haven’t broadcast it now to clear things up, though.”

            “ _True Talk_ ’s been off the air for almost four years,” Arthur told him.  “They might not ‘ave the footage anymore.  And if the committee censored it, then they _definitely_ don’t ‘ave it.”

            “If the committee had censored it, he probably _would_ have said something by now,” Mandy added.   “Unless they were blackmailing him with something and he was still afraid of them.”

            “If they were, it was probably his sexuality,” Curt said.

            “I doubt that,” Arthur chuckled.  “ _True Talk_ was never a popular enough show to make the host’s sexuality of interest to the general public.  Besides, it’s an open secret among the journalistic profession.  His partner worked for _Time Magazine_ for decades.  He had to retire for health reasons, about the same time _True Talk_ went off the air.”  He shook his head.  “Probably AIDS, but nothing’s been said officially.”

            Curt bit his lip.  If Baker had retired to stay home and tend to his dying lover, then trying to drag him into this mess would be really fucking cruel.  “Those goons probably made him edit that part out,” he sighed.  “I guess you’re right that I was stupid to think that would have aired.”  Despite countless suggestions—even orders—to the contrary, Curt had never gotten in the habit of watching his own interviews, or even his own movies.  Hearing his own speaking voice was just too weird.

            Mandy nodded.  “I’m sure they at least ‘suggested’ it, even if they didn’t outright force his hand.  They had to have been all over his editing team, given how bad they were with us.”

            Tommy’s face became a mask, but he couldn’t hide the worry in his eyes.  “They should never have been watching you in the first place, apart from when reporters were coming around looking for me.”

            Curt laughed.  “You’re the biggest idiot ever if you actually believe that.  Those fuckers were crawling all over both of us all the time.”  He tried to grin, but it came out as more of a grimace.  “They must have brought me in for ‘questioning’ at least a dozen times when Arthur and I first started seeing each other in ’84.”

            “You said it was only the once!” Arthur objected, gripping Curt’s shoulder.  “Why would you ‘ave lied about that?”  His voice was so wracked with guilt that Curt couldn’t bear to look at his face.

            “I didn’t want you to worry,” Curt sighed.  Fortunately, they had decided to let the matter go long before Curt started getting idiotically paranoid about Arthur’s motivation in seeing him.

            “They brought me in, too,” Mandy added.  “Asked me to keep an eye on things.  In case…”

            “In case of what?” Tommy asked, turning Mandy’s face to look directly into his own.  “What did they ask you to do?  What were they expecting Curt to do?”

            “No, it wasn’t Curt they were worried about,” Mandy assured him, with a smile.  “They thought Arthur might have been tricking Curt to get information out of him.  So they wanted me to keep an eye on things and interfere if it looked like Curt really was being used.  Of course, that wasn’t the case at all, so I never had to do anything.”

            _That_ was why Mandy had come over so often?  A pit began to gnaw on the inside of Curt’s stomach.  “Is that why you decided to be my agent?  In case I said something to expose him?”

            “Don’t be an idiot.”  Mandy scowled at him.  “I wanted the money.  Besides, I was worried you might sink back into drugs again.”

            “Just at the moment, that doesn’t sound very convincing.”

            “Curt, calm down.”  Arthur stroked his thigh, warm and gentle.  “The committee had professional censors to deal with anything you said publicly.  We just established that.”

            “Yeah, but—”  Curt stopped himself, shaking his head.  “Fuck, this is stupid.  Those guys are gone—outta business and locked up.  So why the fuck are we still running scared from them?”

            Despite how expectantly Curt was looking at them for answers—since they always seemed to know so much about every fucking thing—neither Arthur nor Mandy had anything to say in response.  They wouldn’t even meet his eyes.

            “You shouldn’t have been scared of them in the first place,” Tommy said.  “They only wanted cooperative silence on a single subject.  That’s hardly fearful—”

            “They threatened to _kill_ me if I talked,” Curt snapped.  “Who wouldn’t be afraid of that?”

            “I’m sure they didn’t mean it.”

            “Even if they didn’t, the sheer fact that they made the threat was reason to fear them,” Arthur interjected.  “It’s the sort of tactic used by criminals, not by government agencies.”

            Tommy shrugged.  “They felt the ends justified the means, I suppose.”

            “You should never have been working with people like that in the first place, Brian,” Mandy said, setting a hand on his arm.  “You always used to hate people like that.”

            “I suppose so, but what choice did I have?  The world changed.  I had to change with it.”

            “Once upon a time, you wanted to be the one changing the world,” Curt reminded him.  “Or did you forget about that?”

            A small, sad smile crossed Tommy’s lips.  It was painfully like Brian’s.  “I could never forget all the plans we made.  But we were barely more than children.  Children with delusions to godhead.”

            “That was _your_ delusion, not mine.”

            “Back then, you believed whatever I told you to believe.”

            “Fuck you!” Curt snarled, picking up his beer with the thought of hurling it right at Tommy’s disgusting white suit.  “The only thing I ever accepted just on your word for it was the lie that you were in love with me!”

            The look of hurt on Tommy’s face—pain mixed with a smug arrogance that grated like salt on an open wound—stopped Curt from throwing the beer.  Instead, he slammed it back down on the table, and got to his feet, storming out of the room as fast as he could.  He was vaguely aware of someone chasing after him, but it wasn’t until he heard Arthur’s voice shouting his name that he even slowed down.

            “Curt, what—where are you goin’?” Arthur asked, as he caught up.

            “I’m gonna find the nearest television camera,” Curt said, heading towards the door out of the restaurant.

            “Is that a good idea?”

            “Probably not,” Curt admitted.  “But I’m fucking sick of this shit.  I’m putting an end to it.”

            Arthur glumly objected that even with Curt weighing in officially on the very obvious fact that Tommy was Brian would not actually end the controversy.  But Curt had no doubts.  He’d seen a lot of “man on the street” interviews about it over the past few days.  Most regular people were either in the camp of “yeah, sounds like it’s probably true” or “why are we still talking about this when it doesn’t matter and no one cares?”  It was the pundits and the music critics who couldn’t make up their minds and wouldn’t shut up.

            But once Curt had given them the truth, flat-out, they’d _have_ to shut up.

            Then they could all get on with their lives, at long last.

            …or so Curt told himself, for almost a half a block.  Then he heard yet another voice calling his name, this time Mandy’s.  His plan was to ignore her, but Arthur went and stopped, turning to look at her as she ran after them.

            “You’re not planning to do something stupid, are you?” Mandy asked, looking at Curt’s face with more worry than anything else.  “Brian’s really hurt by—”

            “He’s not Brian anymore!” Curt shouted.  “Stop pretending that he is!”

            “But he is,” Mandy said quietly, setting a hand on his arm.  “Deep down, he always will be.  Couldn’t you see the pain in his eyes, seeing you act like you hate him?”

            It hadn’t really registered with Curt as pain, but now that he replayed the conversation in his mind, it was starting to look that way…

            “If you turn on him now, who knows what it'll do to him."  Mandy shook her head.  "But I think...I think he wants us back in his life.  We can't go back to what we had, but we could at least be friends.  But that can't happen if you tell the world the truth."

            “I don't see what the fuck else I'm supposed to do," Curt said, trying not to think about the image Mandy was painting before his mind's eye, of Brian reaching out to him with a pathetic look of longing...

            “I think I’ve thought of a better way,” Arthur said, breaking him out of his reverie.  “Should end the debate without you ‘aving to betray him.”

            “Oh?”

            Arthur smiled, big and wide.  “I never ‘ave given an answer to Jodi and her friends.  If I let them make the movie, of course they’ll ‘ave to say just what Tommy’s secret _was_.  And they’d make it his past even if I told them not to—they'd make it about his lost love for you, and how I was standin' in between the two of you.”

            “I don’t see how that’s going to end the controversy,” Mandy said.

            “People believe what they see in the movies,” Arthur assured her.  “Even when it’s blatantly untrue.  If the movie is supposed to be based on a true story, they’ll believe it.”

            Curt laughed.  “Sounds good to me!  Let’s see if we can schedule things so we’re out of the country the whole time they’re working on it, so it won’t look like we told them what to film.”

            “But first we're going back to the restaurant," Mandy insisted.  "And you're going to apologize for storming out like that."

            Curt sighed.  "Yeah, let's go back.  But I'm not apologizing for shit."

            “I suppose it _would_ be unlike you to apologize," Mandy agreed, with a sad laugh.  "I'm sure Brian will just be happy to see you come back to him."

            He probably would be, Curt reflected, as they headed back inside.  But no matter what happened, Curt couldn't go back to Brian _that_ way.  They couldn't turn back the clock; the early '70s were not coming back, and there was no point pretending otherwise.  Still, being friends might be nice...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...I think I rewrote that ending five times, each time radically different (just the last third or so). Still not totally satisfied with it, to be honest, but it's much better than the earlier versions.
> 
> Still, if anyone has any suggestions on how to fix it up further, let me know!


End file.
